The final day. We slept in again. Sleep and food are what truly make Arequipa great. The breakfast this morning had the strangest addition yet: tiny hamburger patties. By themselves, nothing that they should go with. Again, for what it’s worth, delicious.
It was a bit of a mournful day. We left our backpacks at the hotel for our final hours in Peru. We saw Juanita the Ice Maiden, a 12 or 13 year old Incan girl who had been sacrificed at the peak of a nearby volcano and frozen in a glacier. She was rediscovered by archeologists more than 500 years later and is now on display in her frozen box for the public 8 months of the year. Honestly, the exhibit was fairly haunting, not just for the visuals, but also because it does a good job creating an atmosphere in which you can visualize the human sacrifice to the mountain gods on the bone-chilling peak. Even one of Juanita’s dolls, which was found next to her in her tomb, was shown right near the body. It actually left me reflecting not just on Juanitas story but on some of the archeological problems her remains represented and also how impressive the museum was for protecting and presenting so many unique, and high quality artifacts to a significant population. No photos- I'm sure you are very disappointed. Needless to say, we spent the rest of the day on more light-hearted activities.
After Juanita, we finished with our souvenir shopping, stopped back by Huayruro for sandwiches and another hibiscus iced tea, and settled down at the chocolate place from yesterday, seeing as they also served craft beer. I napped for a little while on the shady cushions and Stuart read and had a Chaski Porter (pun intended, I’m sure). As the shady deck began to cool, we said our fair-wells to Arequipa and went back to our hotel to gather our bags and catch a taxi to the airport.
We should be home in about twenty hours. I think the thing we’re looking forward to most is being able to brush our teeth with water from the sink. Wish us luck.
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