Colca Canyon - Amazon Jungle - Cuzco

This morning, we had a very early start at 6am as we headed to the Colca Canyon. The terrain was rough, and we climbed to an altitude of around 4,900 metres and then travelled down into the Colca Canyon. The journey took about 5.5 hours and the views were great. This was our first experience of altitude, and luckily I didn’t suffer too badly at all from its effects - thanks to the help of a couple of cups of the local Coca tea. We wandered along the side of the canyon and took in the beautiful vistas, and we also spotted a number of Condors cruising above.

Everything is much harder, slower, and exhausting to do when you’re at high altitude, so we finished off the afternoon with a relaxing visit to the local hot thermal springs.

The next day we began our journey to Cuzco, one of Peru’s most popular tourist destinations. It was a long bus ride (around 12 hours) but well worth it as Cuzco is such a fantastic city – there’s so much to do and see! Cuzco has a lovely feel to it; wandering the cobblestone streets you can’t help but love it.

Cuzco was our departure point for our flight to Puerto Maldonado, the gateway to the Amazon Jungle. We took a bus and motorised canoe to our jungle lodge. The canoe trip along the river took about 2 hours and we saw the first of our Amazon wildlife along the way.

The staff and our guides at the lodge were incredibly knowledgeable. I was a bit uncertain about the night walk that would take us to spot snakes, frog and toads, but I got through it unharmed and even got up the nerve to touch a (admittedly very small) snake!

I did think our guides were joking at first when they mentioned our 4.30am start the next morning, but sadly, they were not. The early start was well worth it though, as we trekked through the lush, green rainforest for a 10km round trip and saw so much amazing scenery. After that we had a chance for a well-earned afternoon siesta. A few of us went down to the river for a swim - the staff assured us it was safe - but I was a bit disturbed when the girl swimming next to me had to rip a piranha from nibbling on her knee!

Our jungle lodge staff had an interesting rule when swimming: if you accidentally touch or kick someone under the water, you have to say ‘That was me’ so that everyone involved knows it wasn’t a caiman swimming around looking for lunch! Luckily my swimming experience was Caiman-free.

We did get a chance to go caiman spotting later that evening by torchlight on the river. We saw four caimans from our boat, and I was very impressed.

I would have loved to relax in the beautiful jungle surroundings for another week or so, but we had to head back to Cuzco. We have a free day today, which gives us the opportunity to visit the city’s many nearby ruins, museums and markets, or perhaps get a taste of more adventure - white-water rafting, or horse-riding.

Tomorrow we set off on the 4-day Inca Trail trek. It’s going to be tough but I’m sure we will all make it and the reward of the amazing ruins at the end of the 39km trek will be well worth the effort.

Cheers,

Leonie