Randy Olson, Melissa Farlow Photography

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Long Road South BOOK_National Geographic 1/1999 198 images Created 1 Apr 2021

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  • The most recognized symbol of Monterrey, Mexico is Cerro de la Silla, the saddle-backed mountain range. It is the backdrop behind the modern orange sculptural monument with laser beams, “Faro Del Comercio” or “Beacon of Commerce,” by sculpture Luis Barraz that is a contrast to the traditional cathedral, Baroque style Cathedral of Monterrey. <br />
Beyond Macro Plaza both colonial and contemporary architecture are found on the streets. The third largest city in Mexico, Monterrey is the capital of Nuevo Leon. It is an industrial and commercial city with cultural interests. It’s said that Monterrey faces more to the north and the United States than south to Latin America.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187480.jpg
  • Novices play ball in a courtyard during a short break from the strict everyday life in a cloistered convent at Santa Catalina Convent in Arequipa, Peru. Older Catholic nuns allow this scheduled play to help the young nuns adjust more easily to the new rules and a routine: They are always silent, pray seven times a day, and never leave the grounds. Visitors to the convent can attend mass but never see life behind the walls where 23 women ranging in age from 15 to 93 make their home.
    MELISSA FARLOW_SP163_655663.jpg
  • A grandmother works picking flowers with her family under the smoking volcano Popocatepetl in nearby Atlixco, flower capital of Mexico.  Workers harvest bouquets of zempazuchitl flowers for Day of the Dead celebrations.  Fields full of yellow flowers are cultivated to decorate altars and graves for the Mexican fiesta.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187016.jpg
  • A lone man is silhouetted while watching a bonfire burn in the street outside the Cathdral in Loja.  San Pedro Y San Pablo is a Catholic religious-themed fiesta. Many of the indigenous festivals celebrating the movements of the sun and the harvests were incorporated into the Christian tradition, resulting in a syncretism of Catholic religious imagery and older indigenous beliefs.<br />
The Ecuadorian city is nestled in the Cuxibamba Valley at 7,000 feet in elevation.
    MELISSA FARLOW_RF4115_2512714.jpg
  • Sunrise aerial photo showing traffic crossing Juarez-Lincoln International, one of four bridges over the Rio Grande River located in the cities Laredo, Texas, and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, that connects the United States with Mexico.<br />
The Pan-American Highway is a network of road that passes through the America's many diverse climates and ecological types – ranging from dense jungles to arid deserts.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187478.jpg
  • Hausos or Chilean cowboys topped with white Andalusian hats watch a rodeo competition. Huasos ride horses wearing the traditional straw, flat-brimmed sombrero called a chupalla.  A growing popularity of the rodeo as national sport is found near Santiago and all around central and southern Chile.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187030.jpg
  • Zapotec Indian women wearing colorful, traditional clothing dance into the night at a wedding party in the streets of Juchitan, Mexico. Weekends are full of wedding celebrations in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the narrow and flat part of the country where the Zapotec culture is still strong. Women are noticeably open and confident, taking a leading role in business and government in matrilineal traditions. The Isthmus never became part of the Aztec Empire and resistance to the Spanish was strong in the mid-1500s. After the church wedding, the couple walks through the streets of town following musicians. They collect family and carry food to where the street is blocked off for the party.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187020.jpg
  • A young Zapotec woman adorned in a flower wreath sits in the shadows during a wedding celebration in the Chagigo neighborhood of Juchitan. Wedding celebrations happen on weekends in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, where traditional culture is strong.  Women take leading roles in business and government in the town with the population of approximately 70,000 people.  The Mexican Isthmus never became part of the Aztec Empire, as resistance to the Spanish was strong in the mid-1500s.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187035.jpg
  • Chilean cowboys in traditional Andalusian sombreros watch as huasos wearing colorful ponchos line up their horses under a flag in the ring. They are competing in a rodeo in ranch country north of Santiago by pinning a steer and trying to beat the clock.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187472.jpg
  • Ecuadorian women weave toquilla straw Panama hats from the plaited leaves of a palm-like plant. The friends work together making hats that exported are exported. Hat-weaving evolved in the early to mid-1600s, became known in the early 1800s and more popular in the mid-19th century when miners of the California Gold Rush traveled to California. ThIs was followed by Theodore Roosevelt who was photographed wearing one in 1906 visiting the Panama Canal.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512681.jpg
  • A hat seller helps load a stack of straw hats onto a truck at a market that sells flowers for Day of the Dead fiesta.<br />
Heavily-loaded trucks carry red Terciopelo flowers to celebrate Mexico’s premier fiesta. Atlixco is the flower capital of Mexico exporting roses and gladiolas from the state of Puebla.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187046.jpg
  • Across a ridge top, a farmer follows his burros burdened with firewood to a mescal factory in rural Oaxaca. The region is where 80% of the mescal made in Mexico. Workers harvest the Maguey plant and bury it with dirt placing it in an oven with hot rocks for 36-48 hours. The burned plant is milled with a horse pulling a heavy stone. It is fermented 8-10 days and the manager plays classical music to help the process. It is distilled twice to be about 70% alcohol and stored for 3-6 months.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187490.jpg
  • Sand dunes encroach on the Pan American Highway, on Peru's coast blown from a secluded beach by strong coastal winds.  The paved but isolated section of the road hugs the coastline in the Sechura Desert south of Casma, Peru. <br />
The Pan American highway connects a myriad of countries and cultural experiences along the 10,000-mile portion of road that stretches through Latin America.  Bustling sophisticated cities contrast desolate desert and rural countryside in Mexico, Peru and Chile.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187474.jpg
  • A young girl carefully carries a baby lamb while helping her grandmother care for their sheep in a rural area in the mountains of Ecuador.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512682.jpg
  • Following the wedding, a bride wearing a traditional, white gown and lace veil, watches while life-sized cutouts of herself and the groom arrive for the reception at a hacienda near Quito.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512689.jpg
  • Cloistered Catholic nuns ride in a modern glass elevator added to the 16th century Convento de Carmen Alto. The Carmelite order was forced to settle in Quito after destruction of their monastery in a 1698 earthquake. Older nuns appreciate the convenience to climbing stairs to attend prayer in the chapel.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512699.jpg
  • Mother Superior joins other nuns for a tasty breakfast at Convento de Carmen Alto, a cloistered convent. Women in the cloistered Carmelite religious order in Quito have jobs and duties performed throughout the monastery daily.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512700.jpg
  • Wind blows makeshift shelters of El Nino victims of flash flooding in the desert of Peru.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187041.jpg
  • Couples weather fog while lounging on a rocky beach in Miraflores, an affluent neighborhood in Lima. Some read newspapers and others sleep while a food vender carries treats looking for sales on a Sunday morning.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187049.jpg
  • Parched and windswept, a cactus stands at the top of Cerro la Raya and the overlook of the ancient city of Túcume in northern Peru. A significant Inca shrine, Túcume actually predates the Inca, its mud-brick pre columbian architectural ruins constructed some 900 years ago. At least 28 pyramids, plazas and crumbling walls made up the ceremonial center of the Lambayeque people (1000-1400 AD).
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187494.jpg
  • Sunlight floods the doorway as Christian worshipers file into Lo Vasquez  sanctuary. They walked during a religious pilgrimage to the Catholic cathedral located near both Santiago and Valparaiso, Chile.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187647.jpg
  • A city bus squeaks to a stop at a park in North Quito and riders crowd in filling empty seats. Talia, carefully coiffed and a fresh coat of lipstick, steadies herself to  ride a bus to Quito's historic district where she will join her friends on streets where transgender prostitutes are allowed to work.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512394.jpg
  • Homeward-bound farm families loaded with food and possessions, crowd into the flatbed of a pickup truck taxi as the open-air market in Xilitla draws to and end. In one of the largest ethnic Huastec Indian towns, each Sunday morning the narrow cobbled streets fill with stalls selling locally grown coffee, sugarcane, incense and corn tamales from the market.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187013.jpg
  • A lone tourist walks among the El Tatio geysers in the Atacama desert north of San Pedro at 4300 meters above sea level in the Andes Mountains. The world's highest geyser field has over 80 active geysers with a steaming field of boiling water that spews and sprays at sunrise leaving white mineral deposits.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187594.jpg
  • Giant hand sculpture rises from the desolate Atacama Desert. Fingers of the  giant, sculpted hand reach into the blue sky out of the relentless sands along the Pan American highway. The Mano de Desierto, constructed by Chilean sculptor Mario Irarrázabal, has a base of iron and cement, and stands 11 meters tall. The art was created as a monument to the emptiness of the vast, barren land.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187505.jpg
  • Cascada Cola de Caballo, Horsetail Fall, has a 75-foot drop as the waterfall flows through Mexico's largest preserve, Cumbres de Monterrey in Las Cumbres National Park south of Monterrey.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052-3.JPG
  • Headlights and brake lights illuminate the darkened road at dusk as traffic moves both directions through customs at the Texas and Mexico border. Commercial trucks and private vehicles cross one of the four international bridges that connect Laredo and Nuevo Laredo over the Rio Grande River.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187567.jpg
  • Pedestrians dash through and underground walkway that leads onto International Bridge Number one, the oldest existing link between Mexico's Nuevo Laredo and Laredo, Texas. Day and night more than four million people-commuters, shoppers and sightseers-walk across the bridge each year.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187476.jpg
  • Pedestrians walk down stairs to  a tunnel under the International Bridge Number one, the oldest existing link between Mexico's Nuevo Laredo and Laredo, Texas. Day and night more than four million people-commuters, shoppers and sightseers-walk across the bridge each year.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187476-1.JPG
  • Father and son cross the Mexican border to celebrate a 21st birthday at a bar in a border town to Laredo, Texas.  The two laughed and sang with the Mariachi band with an accordion in the atmosphere among other tourists among the pinatas.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052-1.JPG
  • Mexicans gather at a popular local bookstore and coffee house to drink, smoke, talk and take in the ambiance.  A trendy meeting place with a casual club atmosphere draws a young crowd to listen talk, eat and drink while listening to live music.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052-2.JPG
  • A respected older musician plays of fiddle and the music he learned from his own grandfather. In the small community of El Carmen, near Pisco, most locals trace their ancestry to African slaves, brought there generations ago to work in the Peru's cotton plantations. The brightly-colored red walls of his home are adorned with family pictures.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187500.jpg
  • Costumed young dancers move to the beat of a young drummer who blends African and Peruvian rhythms in their living room. The family descended from slaves brought to work in the area's cotton plantations.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187502.jpg
  • Novices studying to become cloistered nuns take a break from their prayers at Santa Catalina Convent to sing in the garden.<br />
The young, cloistered nuns never leave convent grounds and live a life of contemplation in Arequipa, Peru. Older nuns allow the young women free time once a day to help them adjust to the cloistered, regimented life. Having just left their families they will never see again, the vow of commitment the novices take is a serious lifelong decision.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187062.jpg
  • Mother Superior's dog greets her in the morning in the courtyard of Convento de Carmen Alto. The convent is home to cloistered nuns in the center of the historic district of Quito.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512704.jpg
  • Cloistered nuns enter the cathedral for a brief private morning prayer and return through fenced gates to Convento de Carmen Alto in Quito, Ecuador.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_2512697.jpg
  • A ghost town east of Iqueque has remnants of the nitrate heyday when saltpeter was mined in the late 19th and early 20th century. Now deserted, Humberstone, was once a model company mining town offered tennis and basketball courts, a swimming pool and theater. The remains are preserved in the dry Atacama desert of Chile.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187586.jpg
  • Cowboy chic bar patrons crowd together under a red glow to watch dancing and mechanical bull riding. The bar scene is packed at midnight in Monterrey, Mexico's third largest city of 3 million, also the capital of Nuevo Leon. A modern, industrial city, Monterrey is described as most Americanized-where the pursuit of profit seems more American than Mexican.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187055.jpg
  • American tourists don sombreros and sing with a mariachi band at a cantina bar in Nuevo Laredo, a quirky border town.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187052.jpg
  • A diner watches people cross El Zócalo, Mexico City's grandiose main square, from the elegant Gran Hotel's rooftop restaurant. Built atop ruins of the ancient Aztec city of Tenochtitlán, the zócalo is now surrounded by sprawling Spanish colonial architecture, the most prominent being the Metropolitan Cathedral.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187014.jpg
  • Mariachis musicians gather a street-side crowd of both Mexicans and gringo tourists for nightly serenading. Plaza Garibaldi is where mariachi bands dressed in sharply, matching suits, have gathered since the 1920s, to play traditional heartfelt ballads for a few pesos.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187015.jpg
  • Restaurant patrons are inspired to join mariachi bands in song at a restaurant  in Garibaldi Plaza. Since the 1920s, traditional musicians have dressed in their finest matching suits and brought their guitars to serenade locals and tourists with heartfelt ballads and earn a few pesos.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187050.jpg
  • Models walk down a runway and across stage lights for a high fashion bridal show featuring designer gowns. The cosmopolitan city of Monterrey is modern and industrial attracting young people with money to spend.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187042.jpg
  • Three tourists walk toward the staircase that leads to the top of the Pyramid of the Sun and Moon at Teotihuacán Aztec site. Teotihuacán was Mexico's biggest ancient city, pre-Columbian and pre-Hispanic empire with perhaps 200,000 people at its peak. <br />
Centuries after its fall, it was still a pilgrimage site for Aztec royalty who believed the gods had sacrificed themselves here to start the sun moving. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the most visited archeological site in Mexico.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187470.jpg
  • Tourists stand on the ruins of Monte Alban, a Zapotec capital. It is a large pre-Columbian archeological site including pyramids and terraces in the Mexican state of Oaxaca.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187608.jpg
  • Tourists walk through the ruins of Monte Alban, a Zapotec capital that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Located in the Oaxaca Valley, it is an important archeological site founded in 6th century B.C.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187610.jpg
  • Tourists climb down steep steps the ruins of Monte Alban, a Zapotec capital with impressive architectural remains in the Oaxaca Valley in Mexico. <br />
It was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Inhabited over a period of 1,500 years by a succession of peoples – Olmecs, Zapotecs and Mixtecs – the terraces, dams, canals, pyramids and artificial mounds of Monte Albán were literally carved out of the mountain and are the symbols of a sacred topography.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187612.jpg
  • Tourists walk through the ruins of Monte Alban, a Zapotec capital in the Valley of Oaxaca. Inhabited over a period of 1,500 years by a succession of peoples – Olmecs, Zapotecs and Mixtecs – the terraces, dams, canals, pyramids and artificial mounds of Monte Albán were literally carved out of the mountain and are the symbols of a sacred topography. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site with unique architecture.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187614.jpg
  • A lone man walks on a footbridge crossing Cascada Cola de Caballo or Horsetail Falls, a waterfall with a 75-foot drop that flows through Cumbres de Monterrey in Las Cumbres National Park in Mexico.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187485.jpg
  • This Mexican photographer has been selling Polaroid instant color photographs to tourists at the base of Cascada Cola de Caballo, Horsetail Falls, for 50 of his 73 years. The waterfall makes a dramatic 75-foot drop through Cumbres de Monterrey in Las Cumbres National Park south of Monterrey.  The falls and surrounding park are a draw for Mexican families for picnics.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187073.jpg
  • A cactus forest in the Oaxacan highlands of Mexico. The massive candelabras of the succulent Myrtillocactus geometrizans can grow up to 16 feet tall.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187572.jpg
  • Huastec Indian seller and an indigenous woman haggle over the price of a pig at the local outdoor market held every Sunday morning in Ciudad Valles.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187012.jpg
  • On the edge of the PanAmerican highway, a Huastec Indian family plays soccer kicking the ball under a clothes line in the front courtyard. The family still follows the old ways in the mountains of Mexico, living in a thatched adobe house and surviving on farming.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187011.jpg
  • A young boy carries a bouquet of bright, red zempazuchitl flowers that his family was harvesting to sell for Day of the Dead, the Mexican fiesta celebration. Pickers work late into the evening under the shadow of Popocatépetl, or El Popo as locals call the volcano.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187064.jpg
  • A young boy picks flowers with his family who was harvesting to sell for Day of the Dead, the Mexican fiesta celebration. <br />
Workers harvest bouquets of cempasuchil or marigold flowers from fields full of yellow flowers cultivated to decorate altars and graves for the Mexican fiesta.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187064-1.JPG
  • Woman places flowers on a graven in Xoxocotlan for the Mexican fiesta, Day of the Dead celebrations. Día de los Muertos is a celebration of life and death and relatives bring food and drink and spend time with their loved ones in the cemetery.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187043.jpg
  • A man sits with family members during a Day of the Dead vigil at a family grave in Xoxocotlan with candles and flowers. Dia de los Muertos is Mexico's most characteristic fiesta where it is believed that souls of the dead return to the earth. Families sit in the cemetery and sharing stories, music and their loved ones favorite foods.<br />
Some grave sites such as this one had a three dimensional sand painting done just for the celebration.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187017.jpg
  • Candles light a woman keeping vigil by a grave in Xoxocotlan during Day of the Dead.<br />
Dia de los Muertos is Mexico's most characteristic fiesta where it is believed that souls of the dead return to the earth. Families sit in the cemetery and sharing stories, music and their loved ones favorite foods.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187009.jpg
  • Man sits in front of alter in his home in Xoxocotlan for Day of the Dead. Dia de los Muertos is Mexico's most characteristic fiesta where it is believed that souls of the dead return to the earth.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187074.jpg
  • On her 15th birthday, a Zapotec Indian girl in Juchitán attends communion at the Catholic church before her Quinceañera, which marks her passage from girlhood to womanhood. <br />
Dressed in her finest white dress and holding a bouquet of flowers, she kneels to light a candle.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187019.jpg
  • Bride and groom light candles in prayer during their traditional wedding ceremony at the cathedral in Juchitán.<br />
After the church wedding, the couple walked through the streets of town following musicians. They collected family members who carried food to a street blocked off for the party.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187075.jpg
  • The bride and groom put their heads together and share a private moment at their wedding party.  Weekends are full of celebrations complete with traditional food and dancing in the street. After the church wedding, the couple walked through the streets of town following musicians. They collected family members who carried food to the street blocked off for the party. <br />
Mexico's narrowest point is the Isthmus of Tehuantepec--flat, country where the Zapotec culture is still strong.  Women take leading role in business and government.  The Isthmus never became part of the Aztec Empire and resistance to the Spanish was strong in the mid-1500s.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187034.jpg
  • After the church wedding, the bride and groom are escorted through the streets of town following musicians. They collected family members who carried food to the street blocked off for the party. <br />
Mexico's narrowest point is the Isthmus of Tehuantepec--flat, country where the Zapotec culture is still strong.  Women take leading role in business and government.  The Isthmus never became part of the Aztec Empire and resistance to the Spanish was strong in the mid-1500s.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187034-1.JPG
  • A U.S. Customs Service agent plays with a search dog near trucks crossing at the Mexican border.<br />
<br />
The Canine Enfocement Program is used to combat terrorism, interdict narcotics, and other contraband while helping to facilitate and process legitimate trade and travel.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187039.jpg
  • Mexican Army patrols a foggy stretch of the Pan American Highway that winds through Los Mármoles National Park in Hidalgo state. Tucked in the rugged Sierra Madre Oriental south of Tamazunchale, the park is renown for its sheer marble cliffs and thick pine forest.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187483.jpg
  • A car rounds a curve along a scenic section of the Pan American highway north of Oaxaca in Mexico.<br />
The Pan-American Highway is a network of road that passes through the America's many diverse climates and ecological types – ranging from dense jungles to arid deserts.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187636.jpg
  • A grandmother and her granddaughter collect grasshoppers in a Oaxaca cornfield. Fried, the insects make a tasty dinner dish.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187018.jpg
  • Workers collect wild agave in rural Oaxaca where 80% of the mescal made in Mexico. They produce 1,000 liters of mescal a month at the small factory. The cut 8 year old wild maguey instead of planted with machetes they wear on their belts.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187029-1.JPG
  • Mescal factory workers taking a lunch break.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187051.jpg
  • Costumed revelers rest in the shade of a cantina while parading for Day of the Dead celebration in rural Mexico.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187040.jpg
  • Costumed revelers march on the Pan American highway in San Pedro Totolapán, Mexico, on Day of the Dead. They stop traffic to solicit handouts from drivers; if no pesos appear, the driver is generally treated to verbal abuse.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187492.jpg
  • A military doctor provides medical care to woman in makeshift clinic.<br />
This is the outcome in troubled Chiapas, soldiers clash with local Zapatista rebels demanding more assistance from the federal government.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187036.jpg
  • Soldiers help a Mayan mother and her baby in Chiapas where the Mexican army clashed with local Zapatista rebels demanding more assistance from the federal government.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187021.jpg
  • A model adjusts her veil and bridal attire backstage at Expo Tu Boda, a bridal fashion show. Designer gowns and evening wear were featured during a convention center wedding extravaganza in Monterrey, Mexico.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187010.jpg
  • Model takes a smoke break backstage as she is styled for a bridal fashion show. Wedding dresses and evening gowns were part of the formal wear shown off to eager young fashionistas in Monterrey, Mexico.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187032.jpg
  • Restored Colonial colonnades edge Lima's Plaza de Armas, bringing many people into the streets of Peru's capital city. The era when the City of Kings was founded by conquistador Francisco Pizarro in 1535, established it as the showplace of Spanish South America.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187022.jpg
  • Matador faces a bull in Peru's oldest bullring, Plaza de Archo in Rímac, a Lima suburb. Red cape flying, sword drawn, the costumed man faces a close call with the angry beast. Bullfighting remains a passion for many Peruvians who revel in its pomp and pageantry--and its inherent danger.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187023.jpg
  • During October Festival of Bullfighting for the Lord of the Miracles, hundreds of spectators gather to critique the finesse of both red-caped matadors and bovine competitors. Plaza de Acho is Peru's oldest bull ring is located in a Lima suburb under the towering Cerro San Cristóbal mountain.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187498.jpg
  • A young boy paddles a tortora reed boat through the surf near a little village of Huanchaco located north of Lima.  The caballitos, or "little horses," are traditional hand-made boats used by fishermen in the region.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187047.jpg
  • Young boy gallops at full speed riding bare back on a horse leaving clouds of dust in the barren, high-mountain Peruvian desert near Chauchilla.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187591.jpg
  • Skeletons bleach in the desert sun Chauchilla Cemetery, a burial ground dating from the late Nazca Period from A.D. 500-700. Grave robbers have looted most of the tombs in this  remote spot of southern Peru, scattering bones, garments and pottery shards across the blistering sands. Tourists pay to see some skulls that have been re-arranged. Mummies with hair, teeth and clothing sit in rock walled tomb-like graves facing east.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187496.jpg
  • Skeletons bleach in the desert sun Chauchilla Cemetery, a burial ground dating from the late Nazca Period from A.D. 500-700. Grave robbers have looted most of the tombs in this  remote spot of southern Peru, scattering bones, garments and pottery shards across the blistering sands. Tourists pay to see some skulls that have been re-arranged. Mummies with hair, teeth and clothing sit in rock walled tomb-like graves facing east.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187496-1.JPG
  • Mysterious Nazca lines form geometric shapes in the desert that are best seen from the air. Besides animals forms, there are more than 800 straight lines on the coastal plain, some of which are 30 miles Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture, which began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187616.jpg
  • Mysterious Nazca lines form animal and geometric figures seen from the air.  A hummingbird shape as well as perfect geometric designs like triangles, rectangles and straight lines run for several kilometers across the desert. The desert floor is covered in a layer of iron oxide-coated pebbles of a deep rust color. Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700. The ancient peoples created their designs by removing the top 12 to 15 inches of rock, revealing the lighter-colored sand below.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187620.jpg
  • Animal figures as well as geometric shapes are part of the mysterious Nazca lines best seen from the air in the Peruvian desert.  The figures--as well as triangles, rectangles and straight lines--run for several kilometers across the dry barren land. The desert floor is covered in a layer of iron oxide-coated pebbles of a deep rust color. The ancient peoples created their designs by removing the top 12 to 15 inches of rock, revealing the lighter-colored sand below. Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187622.jpg
  • Mysterious Nazca lines form strange two-footed animal figures in the desert of Peru. Many creatures as well as geometric shapes run for miles and are best seen from the air. They were made by exposing lighter colored soil when sun-baked stones were moved and piled up. Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187625.jpg
  • The mysterious Nazca lines form a monkey in the desert of southern Peru. Other animals and geometric shapes are best seen from the air. Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700. They were made with light-colored sand when the top foot of rock was removed by an ancient culture.
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  • The mysterious Nazca lines form a spider, one of many animal and geometric shapes best seen in the air in Peru's southern desert.  Anthropologists believe the Nazca culture that created them began around 100 B.C. and flourished from A.D. 1 to 700. They were made with light-colored sand when the top foot of rock was removed by an ancient culture.
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  • A lone street sweeper works at dawn under ornate street lamps lighting the Plaza de Armas in the Spanish Colonial city of Arequipa, Peru.
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  • Novices studying to be nuns, stop to smell the roses in the flower garden of the cloistered convent, Santa Catalina Convent. Built in the 1580s and enlarged in the 17th century, now 30 nuns live behind the walls in silence and prayer. The young novices are given some free time and activities as they adjust to their cloistered life in the monastery in Peru.
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  • Archway and iron gate of the cathedral adorned with turrets on the Plaza de Armas adorned with Spanish Colonial architecture in Arequipa, Peru.<br />
The cathedral has survived the earthquake prone city.  It was constructed in 1656 but gutted by fire in 1844, then destroyed in the earthquake of 1868 but rebiult shortly thereafter.
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  • Cloistered nuns pray seven times a day and otherwise remain silent.  Contemplation is the most important thing in their lives. Santa Catalina Convent, the Monasterio de Santa Catalina was built in 1580 and enlarged in the 17th century. In the chapel, the 30 cloistered nuns come together who live secluded inside the convent.
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  • Cloistered nuns come together for chorus and prayer in Santa Catalina Convent in Arequipa, Peru. Ornate paintings and art adorn the walls of the chapel.
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  • Songs and prayer are how nuns begin their day at Santa Catalina Convent in Arequipa, Peru. The Monasterio de Santa Catalina was built in 1580. Among the 30 cloistered nuns who live in silence are five novices who study for five years to become a nun. The youngest nun is 15. The oldest is 98.
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  • Nuns walk through a cobblestone passage inside Santa Catalina Convent. They are  followed by a dog that greets them while wandering freely the convent.
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  • Stair and original walls from 1580 in Santa Catalina Convent.
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  • First Communion for sisters Kathia Lizeth Humala Marin and Lineth Estefani Humala Marin outside Iglesia San Pedro.  The Sunday celebration took place off the Plaza de Armas. Peru's capital city, Lima's population is 24  million residents.  <br />
Founded by Francisco Pizarro in 1535, the city is located along the desert coast in the center of Peru.  After a disastrous 1746 earthquake, Spanish colonial buildings were built in the period following.  In the Plaza de Armas area the colonial buildings have been repainted, balconies refurbished.  Surrounding cafes have opened and crime is down.
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  • School children dressed in red uniforms play while waiting to tour the Government Palace, the Palacio de Gobierno at the Plaza de Armas. The palace is located in Peru's capital city, Lima which was founded by Francisco Pizarro in 1535. After a disastrous 1746 earthquake, Spanish colonial buildings were built in the period following.
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  • Restored Colonial colonnades edge Lima's Plaza de Armas, bringing many people into the streets of Peru's capital city. Young boys playfully tease each other while hanging out in Lima. The street kids are are good friends and are savvy knowing their way around the Plaza de Armas in Peru's capital city, Lima. Assault, and petty theft make tourists and some locals wary but there is little violent crime in the city.
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  • Dressed up in a suit and bow tie, a young boy patiently waits for cake to be offered while attending a wedding reception in the restored Colonial colonnades edge of Lima's Plaza de Armas.  Well dressed guests mingle at the party towering over the youth.
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