Cusco. . . .again!

Eighteenth stop - Cusco, again! After the trekking we stopped for a bit in Cusco again. A great city and well worth the extra few days for a bit of relaxing, some paragliding over the sacred valley and some site seeing. Good company also delayed our departure. That's me on the blue parachute in this picture - Kristian

Salkantay Trek

Seventeenth stop - Salkantay Trek, not really a stop as we travelled aprox. 95km in 4 days. Tough going but well worth the effort for seeing the destination of Machu Pichu.

Cusco

Sixteenth stop - Cusco, capital of the Inca Empire in it´s hey day and apparently the navel of the world. . . .

Colca Canyon, Cabanaconde

Fifthteenth stop - Cabanaconde in the Colca Canyon. Colca is the second deepest canyon in the world, second only by about 150 metres to it´s neighbour Cotahuasi. . . .

Peru Landing

Ok maybe we are pretty rubbish at keeping this blog up to date. We will get there eventually. We have been travelling north through Chile through the Atacama desert. This morning we crossed the border in the Peru, where we should have walked onto a bus heading north. Unfortunately there is a strike, which means we are stuck for now..... but it also gives us time to try and update the blog......

Arequipa

Fourteenth stop - Arequipa, only stayed one night and only saw Volcano Misti from the bus station. . . .

Arica

Thirteenth stop - Arica, Chile´s border town with Peru. . . .also sponsored by coca cola. . .

San Pedro de Atacama

Twelth stop - San Pedro, the driest place on Earth (apparently). Lunar lanscapes, high lakes, volcanoes everywhere and a few geysers to wander between. Some of the photos almost capture the landscape....

Pan American Highway

Up through the Atacama desert the bus broke down..... it wasn't the last thing to break down on us!!!!

La Serena / Elqui Valley

Tenth stop - La Serena, which involved a day trip to the Elqui Valley, home to the national Picso grape and also some of the largest observatories on Earth.

Mendoza

Ninth Stop - Mendoza, back into Argentina´s wine production capital. The place was at capacity over Easter (interesting times finding accommodation). Mendoza is a place of great vineyards (toured on bikes) and quite a few muggings...

Over the Andes

The road from Santiago to Mendoza travels over the Andes reaching 4200m. We had to do the trip twice.....

Santiago

Eighth stop - Santiago, through the arch, beyond the tree, is Santiago. In the distance is the snow caped Andes.... Well apparently that is what we could see if there wasn´t so much smog!!