Arequipa — the white city of Peru
A paradise of cafes amid ancient buildings
2024/04/06–04/08.
During my final bus trip exploring Peru, I managed to spare two nights in the city of Arequipa between Cusco and Huacachina. It’s not a particularly expensive city, and it’s said to be quite a safe place for tourists. I read some articles online saying that Arequipa is the most beautiful city in Peru and that Cusco has nothing to compare — well, that is simply untrue (yes I’m an advent advocate for Cusco). Arequipa, while it has its beauty, is just a small town of a few blocks with its walls painted white. The most popular activity in Arequipa is to see a famous volcano nearby — I didn’t do it due to my limited schedule and because I wanted to take it easy.
In Peru, if you are a Peruvian citizen, you must pay an additional 18% tax when booking a local hotel, whereas foreigners are generally exempted from it. I booked my accommodation on Booking.com and it shows both values on it, with and without tax.
Upon check-in, the guy at the counter quoted me the value with tax. I protested. I reasoned that I was not a citizen and it was clearly noted that I was exempted from it on the booking page. In response, he answered while giving me a subtle attitude that was just below the threshold to be called out as sass. My Spanish was good enough by then so I was not about to swallow any bullshit and fake rules. After a minute or two, he said fine and made up some fake reasons mentioning some fake taxes of 10% (which clearly doesn’t exist and I’d been in the country for more than 2 weeks by then), hence I should cancel the booking on Booking.com. The real reason I figured, was that since he couldn’t have his way in getting my extra 18% in his pocket, he wanted to avoid booking.com charging him the platform commission fee of 15%. I accepted it and felt so accomplished that I no longer needed to accept unreasonable made-up charges and requests, now that I could fight for myself in their language.
The streets of Arequipa
As the name suggests, they are really white. The whole town looks quite historical. It’s very small and most streets are quiet, except for the 2 streets with restaurants / shops open. The main plaza (Plaza de Armas) has lots of benches and trees to fill the vast space. Along the three sides of the plaza were the most touristy places — I learned from Cusco and avoided dining in any of them to avoid overpaying, but I’m sure some of the restaurants would taste great and come with a nice view.
Since noticing that the city doesn’t have a lot to see, we turned to explore the culinary offerings of Arequipa. I had a wish to try out the fried guinea pig, so we went to a place slightly outside of the historic center and had a good meal.
We it got closer to sunset, we went to a viewing point, only to find out that we could barely see anything because of the weather. It resembled Lisbon a little bit but it was nothing like the view or the experience of Portugal.
And then we headed out to some malls about 2 kilometers outside of the city because I missed the malls a lot. Outside of the historic center there were wider car lanes, but bad traffic as well.
We got talking with a local guy while waiting for the streetside popcorn. He was working in a mine. Similar to the FIFO (Fly in fly out) lifestyle of what they do in Australia, he had just finished his 2 weeks worth of work and were headed back to Lima, where him and his family really lived. Perhaps privileged to think this, but I was thinking to myself: probably only Australia is able to pay enough salary proportional to a job of that nature and risk entailed. At least he seemed content with the salary and job prospect that he had.
The coffee shops
My favorite thing about Arequipa was the coffee shops and the relaxing atmosphere of the city. As the city center is full of white, historical buildings, there were simply so many places to have an aesthetic coffee shop, and they do it well. One could often enter into a gate and discover a whole yard inside, and each corner stands an independent cafe.
There were also less touristy places but very relaxing as well. The weather in April was perfect — it’s not as cold as Cusco. In the words of Ms. Rhode Island in Ms. Congeniality: not too warm, not too cold, all you need is a light jacket.
One of the places that had great Google Maps reviews was a rooftop cacao specialty place. It feels almost like entering someone’s private residents — you have to press a doorbell to enter a building, and walk all the way up, passing through people’s drying laundries. On a clear day, it would have been a good sunset viewing spot. The famous volcano nearby should be in sight as well.
Although we did not have the luck that day, I had the best cold brew in a very very long time. It was infused with cacao beans and the aroma was just unlike anything else. I stayed on the rooftop writing a couple of postcards as the sun began to set.
Overall, I think Arequipa was a great, relaxing spot after going tours after tours in Cusco. In terms of touristy things to do, there is a volcano tour that is supposed to be quite worthwhile to look into, but other than that there is no particular reason to spare too many days in Arequipa if you are on a tight schedule.
Departing from the bus station, we headed off to our upcoming stops. Until next time Arequipa!
