Arequipa to Cusco

Ingrid wrote:

Back to the Arequipa bus station: a slightly (and I mean slightly) more organised version of the Cusco station, for a bit of a wait before the 8.30pm eleven hour bus trip back to Cusco. I finally almost slept! Until 4am...the bus stopped again, and all was very quiet for about an hour...I dozed during this time, mindful that a repeat of Thursday night was highly likely. Only this time, it was even more impressive!!! We were barged in upon by another man speaking in rapid spanish, this time saying the only was we would get through to Cusco was by getting off now, taking all our luggage and walking 2 hours to the other side of the road block! This strike was a continuation of the giant saga regarding privatisation of the country´s water supply (again, laws that were part of the package signed by Alan Garcia as part of the Fair Trade Agreement with the US, and not at all popular). Clearly this is not a viable or affordable option for many of the Peruvian farmers who scrape by as it is, so they have formed very strong protest groups...this one had blocked off a huge part of an entire valley floor, the only route to Cusco from Arequipa, thus affecting many local buses, tour buses and trucks.


Simple road blocks

They had simply covered the road in strips of rocks that were small enough to move but big enough to be inpassable for trucks and buses at intervals along the valley, and there were groups of them sitting (pretty peacefully) at each little farming town, watching us all go by. So...we got off, luckily without too much luggage, as was only a weekend trip, (unlike many of the Russian passengers we were sharing the swanky seats with who had loads, or the Peruvian teenagers in high heeled boots....) and started walking at 5am in the biting cold! Little did we know we would still be walking 3 and a half hours later! We were pleased to have been at altitude for 3 weeks already, as those who hadn´t found it a bit tough going, despite it being mostly flat!


Pasto... what? Where are we?


Locals affected too!

Eventually we came to the end of the roadblocks and a bus came careering towards us and collected as many people as possible to take onwards to Cusco at a charge. We got home around 11am in one piece, if not a little tired, but what an adventure!!!


The end of the blockade.... 3 hours walk from where we got stopped.