LIMA, Capital City of Peru - 22nd, 23rd & 24th August.

On the 22nd Tuesday, we were up at 5am in Iquitos to get the early Lan-Peru flight to Lima. The motokar ride was quite relaxed with absolutely no other trafic on the street. Met Miguel's sister, Susanne and brother Jose who had come to see him off. (Attached is a picture of them on holiday together) Susanne was a live wire with a great sense of humour who did not care how much of her spanish we understood - she just joked away......and Miguel said she was quieter that morning having woken up too early ! The three of them were very close and all very beautiful.

The flight from Iquitos to Lima took about two hours, was really smooth. Flying over the Amazon and then the Andes was breathtaking. With the flight almost empty, we all could move around easily too and Miguel sat with us. Had a great soundless showing of some Canadian TV Gags as in flight entertainment. It was quite good to see humour cross all language barriers. On approaching Lima we saw how the clouds just covered the entire city and were stopped by the Andes from drifting any further inward inland. This explained why we did not see the sun in Lima at all - only grey skies.

Lima airport was quite clean, organised and we saw a lot more tourists here in one place than we had in all our time in Colombia and in the Amazon. We all piled into one taxi, including Miguel, his flat mate Omar and Omar's father who had come to meet Miguel at the Airport - dropped them off first. Our hotel was in the suburb of Miraflores - Hostel Castellena; an old colonial house. Rafael the receptionist was very helpful and pleasant and made sure we got a nice big room with a balcony overlooking the front street, moving us from the room that had been reserved for us. We feel that Peru is more geared for the international tourist with the number of people speaking English or French at the hotel and airports. Colombia was mainly spanish speaking but was nevertheless organised and very easy for tourists to move within.

Lima is a huge sprawling city with a very beautiful historic centre, in a river valley surrounded by low sandy mountains. This area shows signs of occupation for the last 3000 years, the Rimac River area showed true urbanisation around 1200AD by the Cuismancu. It was then over run by the Inca (though not a major site) and the Spaniards (1533). The conquistadore Francisco Pizarro (who named the Pacific ocean in 1513) founded Spanish Lima in 1535 - he was also assasinated here. It was Pizarro, a shrewed milatary leader who made use of the civil war between the two Inca princes (Atahualpa and his brother Huascar) to attack and defeat Atahualpa in 1532, in Cajamarca soon after Atahualpa's victory over his own brother. Atahualpa was held ransom for a huge room in Cajamarca to be filled with gold and 2 rooms full of silver. It took six months to fill this room after which Atahualpa was nevertheless killed in 1533 (strangled as a "christian" after being baptised ??). Lima also has the oldest university in South America, University of San Marcos founded in 1551.

Lima, though large, it didn't have a manacing feel to it. We passed many tall buildings, shopping centres and a few buildings with helipads at the top in the district of San Isidro. We have been to many other big cities that are far more harsher to the eye. Miraflores, where we stayed, is a posh suburb of Lima and the access to it from the airport is on a highway, where you do not see any of the poorer neighbourhoods. Lima certainly has its share of poverty.

After checking in at the Hostel, we walked out towards the Costa Verde, on the Pacific Ocean. Letay had a Churro (a small sweet pastry which we first had in Mexico years ago....Churros would become quite a bargaining chip over the next few days to get Letay to do anything). We went past many fancy stores and restaurants on Avenida Larco, in Miraflores and reached the ocean front shopping zone and restaurant centre - Larco Mar. A very flash place of patios and walkways just at the cliff edge. There are some tremendous views from this point and the restaurants make the most of the location, during the day and night. The locals like to come here for a bit of fun and food. We checked out the shops and then had a super Paella - one was enough for all three of us.

The walk back was through the inner streets of suburb of Miraflores; extremely leafy sidewalks and fabulous homes - most with a lot of security. Back at the hotel it was certainly relaxing to spend some time in the nice bright room, though after North Colombia, and the humid Amazon we were feeling the gloomy cold here in Lima.

Later we found a small Criolla restaurant near the hotel and had great fish dish (Saudado) with a fresh subtle taste, and lamb (Seco de Cabro) made with coriander, chilli and beans. We also had a jug full of the local non-alcholic drink called Chicha Morado - very refreshing. It is dark purple as its made of the dark corn with hint of clove and cinammon. There is also a fermented version of Chicha which is alcholic. Letay (and the owner & staff of the restaurant) sat mesmerised all through dinner by this strange Chinese film on TV in the restaurant. It was combination of Kung Fu and football (great recipe for the box-office) - with players flying through the air, kicking the ball hard to either cause it to turn into a fireball or to cause a tornado in its wake, whilst it hurtled at the opponents goal. Letay laughed so loudly at all the funny bits that after a while many of the people in the restaurant watched her instead. She understood litle of the film, which was in Mandarin with spanish subtitles. Later at night Miguel & Omar dropped in to say hello but Rossini had gone off to try and update the blogsite. They left soon.

23rd August Wednesday - Rossini woke up real early and was set to leave the hotel right away. We had deceided to spend time in ' Lima Centro'. We managed to leave by 9.00 after breakfast - which was downstairs with all the others staying in the hotel (a bit civilised compared to what we had gotten used to). Walked past a huge park called Parque Kennedy towards Arequipa Avenida which is one of the main arteries linking us to the Centro in the North. Passed a movie theatre where the gaurd asked us if we were Indian. He said the owners of the theatre were the Guptas also (once) from India. Lima has a great mix of people including a huge Chinese and Japanese community. Alberto Fujimori, Peru's past president of almost 3 terms was of Japanese decent.

We hopped on to a Colectivo (a small bus, with a fixed fare (25 cents) that stops anywhere enroute picking and dropping off passengers - drivers weave manic through traffic in their desparation to get as many passengers as possible). We got off near the huge Plaza Grau. The whole area was very impressive, wide roads with huge ornate old buildings now either housing a museum, some university, govt. office or just turned into posh residences. You could feel the cultural sophistication, elegance and the glory days of this city - most buildings were quite well mainained. Lima has a great dose of excellent Museums (we counted ten) and cultural centres. On the way to the Centro Plaza we passed the Institute of Italian Art, which was richly decorated on the outside with two huge Mosaics. Dropped in for 60 seconds in the Sheraton so that Letay could get her fill of a "posh" hotel. You also pass through the smaller Plaza San Martin which has seen labour & student demonstrations over the years - the Plaza is still busy with street performers including soapbox "Politicos". There was a park nearby with a simple black stone in the middle with the inscription "Nunca Mas" (Never again). Someone we asked said it was for students & workers killed during demonstrations and others said it was for the African Slaves.

San Martin is joined to the main plaza (Plaza Mayor) by five blocks of Union Street (Jiron de la Union), which is a long walking mall selling all sorts of clothes, shoes from posh shops to rediculously cheap. Heard some super music by Susana Baca & Eva Allyon - two of Peru's great black (Criolla) musicians blasting out onto the street. This made Deepa buy a few CD's of theirs and also of Mercedes Sosa (great Argentinian singer who lives in Mexico now). Letay bought some of Shakira's Music. What was quite funny was seeing a section, as large as the Latin American section, of Indian movie music. These streets are great to just sit and watch people and for good Peruvian "economico" lunches. People in Lima are certainly more reserved than in Colombia (or Iquitos) but they are always very polite and interested when we initiated a conversation or wished first. One old lady we bought sugar cane juice from on the streets wanted to come with us to Australia because she found Letay so interesting.

The Playa Mayor is one of the grandest Plazas in South America with very ornate government buildings, the governors palace (with the changing of the guards) and the Cathedral.



The buildings are almost like Wedgewood pottery in design - very colourful yellows or blues in their main structure with white ornate trimmings all over.
Most noticably are the covered wooden ornate balconies that stick out from all the buildings. The balcony of the Archbishops Palace was the most ornate and oldest. Right next to the governor's palace is the Casa Aliaga, supposed to be the oldest Spanish mansion in South America and inhabited by the same family since 1535, since Pizarro's time.

By 6.30 we were tired and ready to get back to our hotel - got a great taxi driver who chatted away with Rossini about politics & the educational system of Lima.

Miguel met us at 7.30 and with him we once again walked to "Larco Mar'' - the atmosphere was diffrent here at night with a lot more people, however in hindsight we all wished we had gone elsewhere, to a more authentic Peruvian restaurant for dinner. Whilst Larco Mar was great it was more of a modern "global food mall" with a less personal feel. Found a place near our hotel for Churros & coffee. Rossini had a bottle of Siete Raices (7 roots) so Miguel stayed back for a drink with us downstairs. Miguel talked about his plans to continue design studies & work in Italy, perhaps with an Australian detour now that he had met us.........and after several drinks he left much after 12 O'Clock.

23rd August Thursday - With the Lima cloudy gloom, it was difficult to get out early, but we still had a couple of places that we had to see. This morning so we first headed off to the Pre-Inca Adobe mound excavated right in the middle of busy Miraflores metropolis - ''Huaca Pucllana''. It is one of a large number of huacas - sacred places - and palaces that stretched across this part of the valley; the name Pullana presumed to be named after a pre-inca chief of the area. Little is really known about the place. It was uncovered recently - before then the locals of Miraflores just used it as a hill to cycle over.
It's pyramids are entirely made of tiny 6-inch square flat bricks laid out vertically and horizontally. Each stage of building was blessed with an offering of seafood, special pot and human sacrifice. These pyramids and buildings probably extend under much of Miraflores - some still find pots and artifacts in their gardens.


We saw the most odd looking dogs kept here. The breed is the Peruvian hairless dog and I doubt many people would like to have one as a pet. They were very friendly and loved to be patted; cute in a strange way...............something like a Gollum of the dog world.



After the ruins we took a taxi to Barranco, the ''Left Bank'' suburb of Lima; where many artist, writers, musicians and intellectuals choose to live nad where you find many bars, cafes and clubs. The area really comes alive at night with the many Penas around playing live music - many of them advertised who was playing that night.


We walked around the colourful buildings, had lunch at a cafe and then took a manic colectivo back to Miraflores. Did not do much that evening because it was so dull, cold and rained a bit. Rossini & Letay went out for a long walk and had churros & hot chocolate in the street. Dinner was quiet at a small corner place where we had to encourage the owners to serve us or they would fall asleep. Rossini had his first beer in Peru - a bit late considering we were in the country for four days. This delay was due to Siete Raices and the cold weather. Unfortunately they only had large bottles of the Bazilian beer Bramha but he did not complain.

We leave the next day by bus at around 10am for Huancayo, in the Central Sierra up in the Andes.