en-suite room overlooking the family’s courtyard and with a view up to the mountains. As it was starting to get later the temperature was dropping, and we were finally realising how cold it was getting. It turned out that I had somehow got the altitude here confused with somewhere else, we were actually over 3000 meters, and to make things worse we’d left a good few of our warmest clothes in Arequipa at the hostel!! Oops!!

We went out that night for something to eat as none of the places here had kitchens, and found ourselves in a slightly touristy, but very lovely, and most importantly, warm restaurant on the main square. Although soup, trout and red wine may not have been the most traditional Peruvian fare, it was superb, and the fire kept us lingering for a good while after we’d finished. It wasn’t the cheapest place to eat in town, but it was the warmest, and the hotel was dirt

cheap so we didn‘t mind spending a little extra!!

After a bit of a chilly night we woke up and welcomed the sunshine, and decided to have a walk up the valley to the local Hot Springs. This area has lots of geothermal activity, there’s even an active volcano at the top of one of the valleys which can be seen smoking on a clear day!! The walk up the valley was just gorgeous - the road twisted around the bottom following the river. After an hour or so we arrived at the hot springs. They were quite impressive, I think there were 5 pools in total, although a couple of them were closed for maintenance. We started off in an inside one but soon graduated to the outside ones in the sun. It was yet another hot springs with an amazing view!! After a good hot soaking we feasted ourselves on our packed lunch and then headed to another pool which was a bit hotter!! By this time the sun was pretty hot too