Blogs from Lima, Lima, Peru, South America - page 87

A new day and everything is looking much better. Even though the hotel is a bit basic it’s right in the middle of Miraflores and within walking distance to everything. We are all enjoying Lima. I suppose it’s because after only seeing desert for the past week we are now seeing green grass, green trees and lovely flowers…not to mention what the folk in Lima call rain but to us Aussies it’s probably not enough to settle the dust. Did the tourist things about town and went and saw Pulcannia and the other pyrmanids. In the Pulcannia area the developers had bulldozed 11hectares of ruins before the govt stepped in and declared it a national treasure. Saw a native Peruvian dog…somebody has to love it….a dark skinned, hairless dog with just a tuff of orangey ... read more

We arrived in Lima at about 2am and breezed through customs to find a car waiting for us. Steve splurged a bit and reserved us a room in one of the nicest hotels here, the Miraflores Park Hotel. It was so glorious to sleep on a large, fluffy bed after a week of camping out on couches leading up to the wedding. We stuffed ourselves thoroughly at the breakfast buffet and didn´t need to eat again until dinner. We walked around the waterfront a bit until we spotted some ruins poking up between the buildings and took off to explore them. We took a guided tour of the Inca ruins at Huaca Pucllana, which was totally intrigued my long-dormant inner anthropologist! The pyramids and other structures there were all composed of small, hand formed ¨bricks" with ... read more

Monday, July 28th, is el Día de Independencia in Peru which basically means that the world stops and no one works for four whole days (kinda like 4th of July in the States). Some friends and I decided to spend our 4 days of liberation in a small beach town called Huanchaco (about a 10 hour bus ride north of Lima). The first two days we spent just hanging out at the beach (which is one of my favorite things to do at the fault of my mother ). The first day we really wanted to go swimming in the ocean despite the frigid temperature (of the water and the air), but we went for it anyways. I also went surfing for the very first time in my life, which is hard to believe considering that ... read more

Hola! So although not much as changed since yesterday, I suppose that I do have a few things that I can report on (basically I got the opportunity to go to the internet cafe because other people were going and I wouldn´t be able to go alone). Yesterday afternoon we went to the travel agent and officially booked our trip to Machu Pichu, Aguas Caliente/Cuzco. We are leaving friday morning at 5 am (yup we´ll be at the airport at 3 am). I am so incredibly excited to be going. Especially since rumour has it among the locals that they´ll be shutting it down in January of 2009 for a mass restoration project. After booking our trip we bought some cereal and PB to get us through breakfast over the next couple of weeks. As I ... read more

Trying to pack just one bag for six months travel was more of a challenge than I thought and seemed to take forever. Was make-up really necessary? Hell yes. Jeans? Definitely. The trial pack went fine but the final one made me feel and look like a pack horse. I was adamant I would need it all though and got the train to London. But after carrying my rucksack to Clapham I realised there and then I would be doing a repack. I suppose it didn't help that my rather large first aid kit looked like I was going to the Everest by myself. Luckily when I got to Sarah's she made me see sense that I really didn't need 4 moisturisers and space was made. Got a taxi at 5am and after a few pictures ... read more