Last Day in Arequipa

There isn’t a lot to say about yesterday, Monday – spiritually speaking. We had the day off so we hooked up with a 4 hour tour of the city and say this beautiful city.

Every mountain is more than just a mountain. They are former volcanoes. As I said in Blog #4 - three of the 3,000 are active and are connected. They surround the city and give it a great look.

The city is called the “White City” because the Spanish built it from stone cut from the volcanoes or “City of White People” because of the Spanish who settled here. Because the stones from the volcanic activity is not very strong it does not require much of a tremor to cause damage to the buildings. But they also build them with very thick walls so the buildings have endured through the hundreds of years.

Today, the pastor took us on a walking tour in downtown Arequipa which included visiting the cathedral and a couple of other Catholic buildings – monastery and convent. It is sad to see the paganism that attached itself to the Catholic Church with its life of bondage and no hope.

We had a good time and then indulged in some typical Peruvian food - Lomo Saltado – beef, onion, red pepper, rice, french-fries.

Tonight we complete the trip here the Church of our host, Comunidad Christiana La Vina – Pastor Rolando Romero. The focus tonight will be on marriage.

The nights here have been long due to the lack of ability to stay asleep all night. And because the shower has anything but hot water as we know it. In fact, I think it is straight from the snow on the mountains! I think it is easier to just try to cover up with deodorant – but since I use “The Rock” I cannot take that avenue of escape and so I endure the flowing ice-cubes.

We are presently in the Cusco Coffee Café which has Wi-Fi and will be met by the pastor shortly, so I’d better close this and get it posted.

We leave here tomorrow at 11:00 AM and arrive back in Lima about 12:15 PM.

Talk to you later.

Dr D and Marilyn