Trackin Jac's Global Domination: White buildings and white water! Arequipa, Peru

I decided to take a quick trip to Arequipa...a short, 10 hour bus ride from Cusco. I arrived on the over night bus at a ridiculous time in the morning and checked into Amazing Hostel (yes, it was amazing...if for no other reason than the free banana pancake breakfast). After meeting a lovely English couple, we decided to go explore the city. There was a surprising amount of action on the street, considering it was 8 in the morning. There happened to be some sort of celebration/ceremony/parade in the Plaza de Armas. When I asked a local what was going on, he replied "oh, we do this every weekend". Interesting. The different branches of the military were lined up on the streets, some sort of army band was playing (albeit, not that well), and school groups were marching down the street.

Arequipa is quite a charming town! The Plaza de Armas, along with much of the city, is surrounded by buildings made with white stone (silla)....giving it the nickname, la cuidad blanca (The white city).

There is no shortage of gorgeous Catholic Churches!

A lovely river running through the city, which is surrounded by several volcanos...

We finished off the night with a Peru specialty - Pisco Sours - on a bar balcony overlooking the Plaza de Armas.

Day 2: White water rafting. So fun. The English guy and I decided to go white water rafting...the girl wasn't a water fan and insisted that we went together so he would have someone to go with. A shuttle picked us up from our hostel - to my surprise, one of the guys from the Machu Picchu trip happened to be on the WWR trip! We ended up with enough people for 2 rafts. Our guide, "Pappi" (as he liked to call himself), explained all the procedures and we were off to face the rapids! We went through class II-IV rapids, high fiving with our paddles after the successful completion of each. The water was freezing...but the wet suits kept us quite warm. That is, until we pulled over to the side and took turns jumping from a large rock. I had a constant smile on my face...