home again

Our last day in Peru was very long, often stressful, but also included some good experiences. We couldn't get a boat trip arranged -- Saturday was already booked -- so we decided to rent a car and play Che Guevara, riding up the Pan American Norte toward Barranca. We stored our bags at the airport, rented a car, and headed north.

Let me just say that driving in Lima certainly isn't as frightening as driving in Vietnam or India would've been; at least the alphabet is familiar, and I could usually make a pretty strong guess about what the signs said. It's just that the traffic patterns are nuts, people honk all the time, pedestrians cross at random times and places, and I was afraid I'd kill someone. It's fun to drive, it's extra fun to drive a stick shift, but driving in crazy crowded Lima traffic was very very stressful.

We finally left Lima behind and drove through kilometers of the most barren wasteland we've ever seen. High drifts and low mountains of sand, tan colored as far as we could see. The occasional small and unexpected town full of little shacks, in the middle of nothing, with not a single blade of green anything, anywhere. We stopped at a strange and beautiful nature reserve for a nice walk.

have you ever seen green flowers?

pipe organ cactus

these were everywhere

It was strange: green hillsides, lots of flowers,
and dead-looking trees

the view toward the ocean

We never made it to Barranca; we stopped in a town called Huaracha for some lunch, and had what was probably our most authentic Peruvian experience. Although no one paid us any attention whatsoever, I doubt there are many tourists in Huaracha. It's a fishing village, and we found our way to the waterfront where there were several cevicherias. We picked the most open and friendly-looking one, and ordered some food. I thought I was ordering shrimp cebiche, and Marc ordered some kind of fish that was fried, that's about all we knew. His was really wonderful, he said, but mine was a plate full of crawdads, heads and long wiry antennae and all. If my stomach weren't so full of stress and acid from driving out of Lima, I might have been able to manage it a bit more, but seeing that plate piled high with mud bugs just pushed me over the edge and I was trying not to cry. Marc switched plates with me and said it was really good, too. We made a little video of the waterfront on our way out of town, if it's decent, I'll post it so I can remember.

We got back to Lima around 8:30, I think, very frightening driving in the dark with all the rest of the Lima stuff, plus intense smog. Pollution, fog, I don't know, but it was thick. Our plane left at 11:59 or thereabouts, so we had a long time to sit around the airport. At least it's a much nicer airport than the Delhi airport.

And now we're home. It's really great to be home. The trip was truly a dream, we're so happy that we went, so happy that we were together for this trip, and we have a lot of work to do finishing up the photos. I have one more post to make, but it may take a few days. For now, ciao ciao.

leaving the Sacred Valley

It seemed to take days and days, but it was finally time to leave Aguas Calientes. You know how long the hours are, when there is not much to do. So we wandered back to our hotel through occasional little spits and spots of rain, almost unnoticeable, to pick up our backpacks.

And then, le deluge. The skies opened up and poured buckets and buckets of rain on us. We had our Goretex raincoats, which we wrapped around our shoulders and our backpacks full of gear (cameras, etc) and made a run for the train station on the other side of the river. By the time we got there, our pant legs were soaked, as were our feet, but the gear was dry. We settled in for the 4-hour train ride home.

So this is the funny thing about public transit in Peru: the entertainment. On the bus home from Nasca, cards were distributed for Bingo. The whole bus (except us, I think), played Bingo. It was funny. PeruRail does something wilder. On the ride back to Cusco, the attendants put on a fashion show. I had my eyes closed, but I heard the music.....runway style music. Marc said the attendants were doing the whole shtick -- the model facial expressions, the runway strut, the turns. When it was all over, they wheeled a trolley up and down the aisles selling traditional alpaca stuff, sweaters, hats, socks, etc. Before the fashion show, a guy came out in some kind of old traditional clothing with a white face mask covering his head, with red slits for the eye holes. It totally freaked me out, I did not like it at all.

Pulling into Cusco felt like coming home. I swear I think I could easily chuck it all and open a little shop in Cusco for the rest of my days. Marc and I went back to the restaurant run by those two girls and ordered three dishes, which were (as before) cooked individually, after running out for ingredients. Yum.

Yesterday we flew back to Lima, back to the hotel (and room) we left so long ago. It's an odd feeling; our vacation is really over, but it's not over yet. We have to kill time in Lima until our flight leaves just before midnight tomorrow night. We're trying to figure out how to spend all day Saturday after we check out of our hotel. Maybe a cruise around some nearby islands (called, like all the nearby islands, the little Galapagos), maybe rent a car and drive north, who knows.

I feel (and so does Marc, I think) ready to get home. This has been so remarkable, a truly unique and amazing trip. It's the first place we've been together that we both would come back to. I'm not at all eager to go back to work, but I think it's time to get home. Since I don't have a computer, and next week is Thanksgiving, it may take a couple of weeks before I get photos uploaded, but if you are interested, I'll post a note on my main blog when the photos are here.

As everyone here says, ciao ciao.

Plaza de Armes

Two very happy people, at the Plaza de Armes in central Lima. And get this! A Texan took our picture. Of all people. We were walking around looking for another tourist who spoke English, and we saw this couple of old hippies who looked like they might be from the US. I asked if they spoke English, and the woman said si. Then she laughed at herself for that, but they were very kind and the long-haired guy agreed to take the photo. Turns out they have a farm around Cleburne.

This old colonial church faces the plaza. I'm sure the fountain
has a history, but I'm not stopping to look it up right now.

We stopped for lunch at this little sidewalk cafe on the Plaza San Martin. Marc ordered pollo y fritas, and I ordered a hamburger royale. My hamburger had a fried egg on top of the meat - eggs seem to come on a lot of things, for some reason. I guess if you've got a lot of chickens, as they have here, you've also got a lot of eggs. We got a pitcher of fresh lemonade too, so cold and good. And the whole lunch was ~$7 US.

I'm happy.

Lots of public safety at work -- tanks and water cannons:

People didn't seem to pay any attention.

Big churches

with ornate stonework

and birds

and statues of men on horses

The cab driver who took us back to our hotel was this young guy who sang with the radio, at the top of his lungs. It was really wonderful. I wish I'd had the video camera just so I could capture the audio. He was not at all self-conscious and the music was great. The wind was in my hair, there was Peruvian music blasting all around, and Marc and I were smiling at each other. It's been a really beautiful day.

Miraflores and the Southern Hemisphere

So this is the deal! I've just needed to be in the southern hemisphere. If you know me, you know that I have an abysmal sense of direction. It's almost perfectly wrong -- if I think we should turn left, we should probably turn right. I'm correct just often enough to screw me up as a resource, only wrong 90-95% of the time. But all that's been wrong, all this time, is that I have a southern hemisphere head, in the northern hemisphere! My sense of direction here is awfully good. I know we need to go that direction, and I'm right. It's quite bizarre, really.

We have our breakfast place, this lovely little cafe where we can navigate our way through the meal with our insufficient Spanish, mostly because -- as usual -- the people are gracious and try very hard with us. This morning I got fresh fruit with yogurt and honey, and a cappuccino. The place is gentle, run by women, and the decor is gentle too. It's our spot now.

I want to make a separate post about Nasca. Lots to say on that one. We really like Miraflores, even though it's the ritzy suburb of Lima. We know we're not experiencing Lima -- we're heading to the center of town today, to see the colonial stuff everyone is supposed to see in Lima.

Vacation is wonderful.

today Lima, tomorrow Nazca

We spent the morning trying to arrange a trip to see the Nazca lines -- something of an ordeal. Back and forth, between Casa Andina and a travel agency. We thought we had it done: two days and one night, flyover, easy trip. Instead, at the last minute there were no hotel rooms in Nazca, so we're going down and back tomorrow. It's a 6-hour bus trip one way, a 45-minute flyover to see the lines, and then a 6-hour trip back. And the kicker? We have to be at the bus station at 4am tomorrow. Still. It's the Nazca Lines. Once in a lifetime.

After that, we wandered around Miraflores. It's really so much more beautiful than we thought it might be. There's nothing truly distinct about it, architecturally, as there is in Hanoi, or Paris, or Amsterdam, but it's charming and liveable.

Bimbo. I didn't even notice the woman to the left until I saw the photo on my computer.

Along the coastline, overlooking the Pacific Ocean,
are these enormous glass-fronted apartment buildings.

This church is really beautiful, I have other pictures.
There was some kind of art class going on right in front.
People were setting up their easels.

The coastline. That's a restaurant on that jutting
promontory, into the ocean. More on that later, maybe.

Every coast needs a lighthouse.

Beautiful landscaping in this park.

Miraflores.

This huge statue of people kissing seems to inspire
people to come here and kiss. Couples were
everywhere, doing some serious making out.

Yellow. Red.

Blue. Yellow.

We're eating dinner at Las Brujas de Cachiche, a 20-minute walk (or so) from our hotel. More to tell, later tonight.

getting to Lima

We were sitting in the Newark airport talking about our experience of international flights leaving on time; when we flew to Singapore and Delhi, both left on time. Our flight to Amsterdam, right on time. So we figured the 2:50 flight to Lima would be the same, but it wasn't. We got a late start, about an hour, which meant getting into Lima at almost midnight. But who cares.....everything else went just perfectly. We didn't hit traffic going to Newark, we didn't get lost finding the long-term parking, we found a great spot right by the bus stop, the bus came within a couple of minutes, and the security line wasn't too long. The only weird thing was the luggage. I think everyone who was flying to Lima (except us!) was taking at least a dozen huge suitcases, plus appliance-sized boxes. Seriously.

As always, he has to pace before we get on the plane. Back and forth, off to Starbucks for me, general excited pacing. It always makes me happy to watch him do this.


The flight was pretty good, no screaming children, but it seemed so long. I think I had it in my mind as a short flight -- compared to the 19?-hour flight to Singapore, it was! But really, 8 hours isn't short. Since I was thinking "short," 8 hours felt really long. But we were lucky here, too: we had an empty seat between us. Plenty of room for all our stuff, and for being comfortable.

Shooting a little video of the take-off

No monitors on the backs of seats, unusually. Only the drop-down type every three rows.
I missed taking my pictures of the flight path.

Shaggy clouds, gray and dirty-looking.

But a gorgeous sunset -- see, it just dipped below the horizon.

We had a wonderful breakfast this morning in a little cafe -- more about that later. The funny thing was the music: Rod Stewart and Cher singing the classics. Bewitched, bothered and bewildered. Smile, though your heart is breaking.

Off to see Lima.

cloudy skies

LIMA:

Fri Nov 2 Partly Cloudy 62°/56° 0%			62°F
Sat Nov 3 Partly Cloudy 65°/56° 0%			65°F
Sun Nov 4 Partly Cloudy 66°/58° 0%			66°F
Mon Nov 5 Partly Cloudy 67°/58° 0%			67°F

Apparently they rarely see the sun this time of year in Lima. Still, it's on average 5 or 6 degrees warmer there than it will be here, at home. Going south to "balmy" weather, I guess! And it's pretty close to the equator, what a mystery. I'd have thought it would be much warmer. Lima isn't high in the Andes, either; it's on the coast.

It looks like Cusco might be rainy while we're there, and my fingers are crossed for Machu Picchu to have decent weather. Even if it's rainy, we'll be up on that mountain. Well, you'll see.