your passport and it will cost you an arm and a leg to get a new one from a British embassy abroad.

After completing both sets of customs we climbed back into our trusted jalopy and headed off to the nearest bus station where we had tickets for onward travel to Arequipa. We were warned that the bus station was pretty hectic and for us to take care of valuables and watch out for pickpockets, but to be fair the bus station was fine and we didn’t see any unsavoury characters. Inside we found ourselves in a greasy spoon type of café but were surprised to fine that the sandwiches and juices were more than edible and in-fact were quite nice. So here we were in Peru our 27th country.

Our bus wasn’t quite to the same standards as the buses in Argentina or Chile but it certainly wasn’t

the worst one we have ever travelled on. There was a bag check-in section which is always a good thing so things couldn’t be that bad. Just as we were about to get on the bus and we noticed someone with a video camera. I instantly thought they were making a promotional video for the company so gave them my best smile and said Hola, whereas Rob just looked the other way! We later found out that it wasn’t a promotional video at all, they just video all of the passengers getting on in-case the bus crashes, so it will be easier for them to identify who was on the bus in the first place - not very reassuring it has to be said!!! Thankfully the driver didn’t come from the Damon Hill school of driving and we set of at a fairly leisurely pace.

We’d booked the front seats due to all of the buses in Brasil, Argentina and Chile having more leg room in these seats, unfortunately in Peru this is not