Landed in Lima

I arrived in Lima without a hitch, took a bit longer than expected to get through Immigration/customs but managed to meet up with Morgan moments before he was about to give up on waiting. Getting to the hostel proved to be a bit of a journey as the cab driver didn´t know the address. Long story short, I finally laid my head down on the pillow at 3am and woke today somewhere around 8-8:30am. Nothing like starting a trip on a total of 8 hours sleep in the past two days.

This morning I had a good cup of coffee and then we headed off on foot to explore the Miraflores region of Lima including the Park of Love, the beach and we managed to catch a few incredible close up views of a couple of guys parasailing off the cliff during our lunch. I think that might need to be on the agenda for tomorrow! Sounds like Morgan is game, I hope to report back with some photos to capture the moment. We did a tour of the Huaca Pucllana Temple De Adoradores Del Mar ruins here in Lima, it´s currently being renovated but something like 70-80% is the original structure made of adobe bricks. Interesting but I´m guessing it pales in comparison to what we will see in the next few weeks.

There are a few things I´ve learned about Peru thus far, 1: when crossing the street - do so at your own risk. Peruvians will honk and flash their lights before they ever think about applying the brake, in fact I´m pretty sure they speed up at the same time. Its all quite interesting when you consider that many intersections have no traffic lights or cross walks and its a big free for all with cars coming from every section at the same time. 2: they love love love to use the horn, you can hear a melody of car horns from the time you get up until almost 8pm when traffic finally starts to die down. They don´t seem to use them as a hostile notion as we see in America but more of a "hey I´m right here, hope you see me" kind of way. 3: most women walk around with a big frown, maybe this keeps unwanted male attention at bay???

Those of you who know me will understand that I can´t add a posting without discussing food! I´ve been playing it safe on the food front but Morgan is tempting fate. He had salad for lunch with a glass of water (which we think was filtered) and ceviche for dinner. So far so good but he´ll have to beg if we wants to steal some of my pepto tomorrow. I think I´ve figured out how to finally say that I´m "allergic to wheat" and be understood but I still get some interesting commentary I can´t understand in response to my disclosure. For lunch I had chicken stuffed with bacon and cheese with steamed asparagus and spinach which was wonderful. For dinner we went to a traditional Peruvian restaurant near the hostel where I had a steak with mashed potatoes with a mushroom sauce. We both had desert and the total cost for dinner including the tip was $29 US.

After dinner we went to an alley of restaurants to get drinks and were accosted by several employees per restaurant trying to lure us in, very aggressive sales and I can´t count how many free Pisco sours I was offered as a lure to try their establishment. For those of you who have not tasted a Pisco sour, it´s reminiscent of a potent margarita with more sugar and sour with egg white frothed on top. The prices for alcholo at some of the touristy spots are more like home but there are great deals everywhere. It also appears that you can get one free drink per establishment if you play your cards right! Earlier we hit a local grocery store and bought some goodies for breakfast for just over $11 Soles. Not bad considering we got a grapefruit, a bunch of bananas, soy milk, a box of kellogs corn flakes, and a large bottle of water for a grand total of $4 US dollars. Try that in the states, the box of cereal alone would be $4.

Pictures to follow later!