One of the most beautiful places we visited in Arequipa, was the Santa Catalina Monastery. Built in the late 1500’s, and also suffering damage over the centuries due to the many earthquakes, it has been rebuilt and restored to it’s current beautiful state. It was not allowed any visitors up until 1970. Before that it was, only the nuns that lived there, which at one point had more than 400 living there which included the nuns and their servants. The only visitors allowed were catholic priests. This village was so big, it took us several hours to walk it all. Again built with the volcanic rocks, and painted bright red and blue, it was breathtaking.
There were many rooms which showed how the nuns lived and each one had it’s own kitchen. They used to all bake bread and pastries which they would sell in the main square to raise funds.
They even sowed how they used to do laundry. They had 20 large clay pots, each one with a spout connected to the main water trough, built on an incline, so that water poured down and into each pot. It was ingenious and amazing.
It was an enjoyable afternoon, seeing how simply the nuns lived and what a beautiful place they used to call home.
