We climbed up to a grassy bowl at the head of the canyon at just over 3000m, kept green by the microclimate created by the spray of the falls. Here we spent the next 30 minutes sitting and watching the impressive sight of the water racing down a steep gully from the 5000m plus heights, before thundered out of a deep cleft in the canyon wall. It fell in surges, spraying out mist as it crashed into a small pool to feed the rushing torrent that carried it down the canyon floor. It was definitely worth the extra climb to see.

However, the sun vanishes early in this narrow canyon and it was time to head home, retracing our path back amongst the curious pods of deciduous trees and past silver-stemmed black-flowering bromeliads. We returned as the evening light was fading, tired but happy with the walk so far and a chance to see what life is like in the isolated villages of this remote part of Peru.

The canyon wall above Llatia

Today was to be an easy walk, so we could sleep in a bit later. Still, in this canyon country the sun rises later still; the crests were bathed in light, but the sun was just starting to work its way down the opposite canyon wall when we set off. From Fure, we backtracked across the waterfall, climbing slightly across deep shade of the canyon wall before descending for a kilometre to a junction in the tracks.

Here we headed off in a new direction, following a loose shaly path that zig-zagged steeply 250m directly down the slope, through a group of flowering agaves and into the sunlight, now starting to climb slowly up our side of the canyon. On the way down we could admire the centuries-old tracks on the opposite wall, some meandering across steep traverses, some zigzagging their way straight up to the canyon rim and beyond, all in some way connecting the dispersed villages and fields of the Colca Canyon.

It was a very pleasant walk; the morning light highlighted the profile and shapes of the canyon walls as we wandered by groves of poison trees (whose sap is so caustic it is used to brand cattle), slopefuls of prickly pear and xerophylic shrubs, plus the odd straggly and out-of-place eucalypt. Bromeliads clung to the steep rockfaces above and below us we could see the smooth curve of an old canal system taking water to the village below. We followed its course before eventually descending steeply to reach it and cross it. From time to time, people passed by on their daily business greeting us with buen dias and holas - an old lady, a father and child, a man clearing the track with his machete, a mule train - life rolls on at its own rhythm in the canyon.

Not far below the canal, we stopped at a point where we could see the junction of the Huaruro and Colca Rivers beneath bare orange rock walls. Then, with one last look back up the ruggedly beautiful Huaruro Canyon, we commenced a long series of zig-zags on a rocky path down through old terraces and fields of prickly pear in the shade of spreading pepper trees.

A grove of dark green densely-foliaged pacay trees signalled our arrival at Llahuar (2150m), perched on a shelf above the river junction. We were greeted by the jovial owner of the rustic lodge here, a cool wind blowing up the canyon and the sight of a solitary condor, shadowed on the opposite rock face and dwarfed by the immensity of the canyon wall.

It was only late morning, but the lodge here was our destination. The afternoon would be ours to relax, explore the Colca River and soak in the thermal pools.

The pleasant terrace of Llahuar Lodge overlooked the Colca River and a grassy verge above the thermal pools below. It was a great place to sit in the pleasantly cool breeze sipping a river-chilled beer after an afternoon soak in the thermal pool at the river's edge.

The views down river were impressive, with the strong contrast between the two walls of the canyon; barren sunbaked north-facing walls, bare apart from dry grasses and the odd shrub and more-protected south-facing walls, covered in prickly pear and xerophilic shrubs.

 

We were back to the early morning starts, eating breakfast by torchlight in the cool pre-dawn - not because of a long day's trekking ahead, quite the opposite. Today we would only walk a few kilometres before meeting a 4WD vehicle for a trip through the mountains down to the Atacama Desert and back to Arequipa. So, after a feast of pancakes at the Llahuar Lodge, we set off shortly after 6am, following our speedy lodge host and Elias along a narrow track about 30 metres above the river bed in the early morning light.

This was once again "Inca Flat" terrain, with a series of ups and downs across the rocky slope, before we made a short, sharp descent of a loose conglomerate cliff to river level, to pass beneath the pinkish-tan rock walls of this constricted part of the canyon.

Crossing a ridge, we descended to Huambo, the last of the villages in the Colca Canyon region and set amongst a mosaic of green fields in a side valley high above the river. From here we could see the snow-capped peaks marking the extremities of the far side of the canyon. Leaving Huambo, the road took us up above 4000m into the high rolling hills of puna grass, with occasional glimpses across the itchu tussocks to the snow-capped 6380m summit of Volcan Ampato, famous as the resting place of the ice maiden Juanita (the almost 500-year old mummified remains of a young incan princess sacrificed on the mountain's summit to appease Apu Ampato - not only were the incan people good stonemasons, they were the first serious mountain climbers!).

As we descended from the high plateau towards the coast, the terrain gradually became more and more arid, puna gave way to stumpy shrubs and cactus - cactus species changed to more drought tolerant ones until finally we entered a bone-dry quebrada where only a few hardy candelabra cacti grew in the grey dust. Yet here there were ancient terraces, built over 800 years ago by the Wari people when this was once a fertile landscape (take heed, all doubters that climates can change). We were entering the realm of the Atacama desert, the driest place on the planet where no rain has fallen in over 80 years.

The landscape was surreal, and the most surreal of all was the huge expanse of lush green lucerne and corn crops fed by misting sprinklers in the hot desert sun - part of a huge plan to make the desert bloom with the waters of the Colca River; dairy farms in the desert and atacama yoghurt. Coming from a waterstressed country where we are desperately trying to repair the damage of unsustainable irrigation schemes, I confess to being gobsmacked. Turning north, we made one last descent to the Colca River, now flowing through a broad valley; an oasis of green surround by high bone-dry walls of grey conglomerate and sand, lined with whitish sillar stone, the compressed ash of ancient volcanic eruptions.

Our destination was Toro Muerte, a recently discovered site of 800-year old petroglyphs carved in exposed sillar boulders scattered on a slope of greyish sand; fascinating insights into the culture of the Wari people, and even more fascinating insight into the minds of modern day idiots who seek immortality by vandalising such sites with their own initials or fake petroglyphs.

Some different petroglyphs carved in sillar

This part of South America is a surreal place and, as we sped back down the Panamerica Highway to Arequipa, I suffered much frustration in trying to capture, from the window of a moving car, the grey and tan flatness of the desert habitats, the lurid green of the irrigated fields juxtaposed with bare desert, the maroon and grey hills and quebradas, and the red rocky ridges. I realised why I prefer walking to see and appreciate the landscapes that I visit.

Grey and maroon hills west of Arequipa