August 16 - 22, 2008 OK, where were we? Oh yeah, Puerto Eten and Reque. We made it back home to Pimentel and prepared for our next leg of the trip to Mancora (MAHN coh rah). This is how we got there: From Pimentel, we arranged to have a taxi pick us up at zero dark thirty (OK, it was 7:00am) and take us to the LINEA bus terminal in Chiclayo. We had purchased our tickets in advance which is almost ALWAYS the best way to go about traveling by bus. We were not willing to risk the trip to Chiclayo [View Full Entry]

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Did you know that Peruvians have large families? I found that out the hard way. Rose told me that a couple of uncles she had never met wanted to meet her. We should invite them for lunch. A day or so earlier, we had found the absolute best food in the town of Pimentel. If you are ever here, you have to go to a place called La Tiendita del Pato. Pato is a pretty hefty guy. All right, he is big, huge, a very large man. It was easy to see that he enjoys good food. His little place is [View Full Entry]

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Rose and Ray on R&R in Peru August 2 - 6, 2008 Rose’s sister, Valeria, owns a fishing boat here in Peru. They fish for anchovies, so the next time you get one of those stinky little dudes on your pizza, I can tell you where it came from. The boat (Alaska 1) was docked in Chimbote, and the captain told us that it was somewhat of a minor miracle that they were just arriving and off-loading their catch at the time they were there. They normally arrive in the wee hours of the night, off-load, clean up, load with ice [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday, July 28, was Peruvian Indendence Day. Flags were raised, parades were marched, salutes were saluted. It was a huge party for everyone. We traveled to a small town nearby called Monsefu'. (Mohn seh FOO). We went with our new friends, Tom and Maribel. He is a transplant from the States and Maribel is his lovely wife. He is a fairly brave individual. He has left his former home in the US to move permanently to Peru to start his new life with Maribel and her son, Brian, who is a really nice young man. We just made a day of [View Full Entry]

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Today was a do-nothing day. Well, not exactly. We walked, and walked, and walked some more. We heard an independence day parade going by, so we stopped a little while for that. Peruvian Independence day is July 28. We took a LOT of pictures today and I will post as many as I can. We walked all over Pimentel looking for a decent place to eat that was not on the beach. We finally abandoned that line of thinking and went back to the beach restaurants. Sometimes when you see the behind the scenes of these places, it makes you wonder [View Full Entry]

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Thursday, July 24, 2008. Rose’s sister, Valeria, arrived the night before and stayed at our apartment. She and Rose had a great time unpacking the tons of stuff she brought with her, and deciding what went where. We had already decided that our luggage was overweight, so we packed as much stuff as we could live without and sent it from Lima to Chiclayo by bus. Valerie did the same only the next day. The Peruvians have a kind of neat system where they completely wrap the suitcase or box in what appears to be Saran Wrap. That makes them pretty [View Full Entry]

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Well, yesterday was a fun day. I learned a new Spanish word, marcapaso, which means pacemaker. I just had one of those installed in my chest about one week prior to leaving the States. It started oozing a little and Rose freaked out. She made me call my cardiologist using our Skype connection via the laptop (www.skype.com). Long story short, cardiologist said, "Get thee to the nearest emergency room or clinic and get checked out." I walked to where I thought I had seen a clinic, asked a policeman where was a clinic (Look, I'm starting to think in Spanish.) and [View Full Entry]

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I am just going to pop a few photos from our last trip that was about two or three years ago. During that trip, we spent several days in Lima visiting Rose's relatives and visiting where she was born. After that, we went to the usual touristy places, Cusco, Ollantaytambo (where I could easily spend the rest of my life), Aguas Calientes, Machu Picchu, the Nasca lines, Paracas, Ica and Pisco. We spent a nice week in a cute fishing village called Santa Rosa near Chiclayo/Pimentel area. This is where I first saw the caballitos, or little horses. These are basically [View Full Entry]

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