First Week in Arequipa

We have finished our first week of workshops in Arequipa, & leave tomorrow morning for the Colca Canyon. I have been doing hand embroidery with fellow participants from Ireland & Canada, with our teachers the very lovely & funny Elena & Annabel from Huancayo. There is so much work that goes into their hand embroidered clothing, & we spent 4 days working on what will be the size of a case for sunglasses! It is quite cold here overnight & early mornings, but hot in the middle of every beautiful sunny day. The skyline is really spectacular, with these enormous snow capped volcanoes, glimpsed over colonial walls & modern buildings, & many church towers. We have sampled more Pisco Sours, a really grat refreshing drink, Peruvian beer & wine, lots of agua minerale sin gas (bottled spring water- it is so dry here it is easy o get dehydrated, & dealing with altitude acclimitisation also requires lots of fluids), many delicious & unusual meals, & yes, I have eaten both cuy (guinea pig), & alpaca, both very tasty! We have also done lots of shopping, & I felt very pleased with myself actually getting my suitcase shut. Everythibpng here is very reasonably priced, & there are so many beautifully crafted works. It has proven to be hugely expensive to freight purchases home, so I will be carrying everything everywhere! To bed now, to prepare for tomorrow's ascent to 4500m - a pass over the mountains, before we descend to 3500m where we are staying so altitude adjustment will be quite big.