Arequipa

Ok, so Liz and I are safe in Arequipa. We were supposed to board the bus at 6pm last night. We didn´t get on until 7:30 - nothing I´ve been told is ever on time. We are learning this quickly. Liz and I (for an unknown reason) got bumped up to first class! Our fellow American traveler friend, Jeremy, was waiting for us on the lower level. We were in a nice private room with two other passengers. Comfy seats that recline all the way. We were supposed to arrive in Arequipa at 8 am, but did not arrive until noon. Several times in the night the bus would pull over to the side of the road so that oncoming traffic could pass. We all had to wait our turn. The roads were full of debris from falling rocks and the in some parts the road had foot wide cracks from the quake. We drove through Pisco and Ica. Those were the towns most devistated by the earthquake. Peoples homes were crumbled to the ground. They had pulled matresses and refridgerators out side and were sitting by fires. It is very cold at night. But for the most part our journey was good. We watched a couple of movies, I took some dramamine and was out for the night.
The woman who ran our hostal in Lima said her brother would be waiting for us at the station. I hoped he wouldn´t be there since we were four hours late. But we were greeted by a sign for Elizabeth and Brin Tyrrell (so far no one can ´get´my name). I´m not sure why he even met us there, he didn´t have a car and just took a taxi with us. I am having a hard time understanding his spanish too, so it makes it hard to communicate. And poor Liz never has any idea what were saying until I remember to translate. Sometimes I make things up so that he thinks I understood hom, but I´ll tell Liz Í really have no idea what he´s saying... something about war´ for example. He helped us find our hostal and then took us on a little tour to some Portals at the edge of hte city. Very beautiful. We also had a great vantage point for the Misti Volcano. Don´t worry, it´s not active.
Arequipa is beauiful and the weather is awesome. We are heading out tomorrow though. Our next plan is to head up to go hiking in some canyons and swim in hot springs. But we will return to Arequipa for a few days before heading to Cusco.