Blogs from Lima, Peru, South America - page 171

Hello from Lima, Peru! I’m traveling in South America for the next two months so this blog will temporarily be a “South America” blog instead of a Costa Rica blog. I’ve never had two months off to travel, so this should be an adventure! I picked Lima as my home base, and from here, I hope to visit more of Peru, then Ecuador, Chile and Bolivia (not necessarily in that order). When? Where exactly? For how long will I travel in each country? These are questions I cannot answer at the moment as I’m making no specific plans. I’ll get up and go when I’m ready, stay as long or as little in one place, and then move on. It’s all about exploring and deciding for once in my life, where and when I want to ... read more

June 14. Today we flew from Lima to Cusco. We flew LAN, arrived at the airport 1.5 hours before our flight, and received our seats - the first two rows! LAN didn’t have first class seats, so do not get too excited. The flight on LAN was wonderful - a rather new plane, short films shown on board, and a snack of a cheese sandwich and cookie - rather welcome at 10 am. The approach in to Cusco can be windy and rough, but it was our lucky day because it was pretty smooth with only an occasional bump. The Cusco airport has been renovated also to be a nice facility, very welcoming. In the luggage area are a multitude of travel agencies willing to help the traveler who needs assistance, as well as a band ... read more

Yes, finally updating the travel blog! So far the trip has gone quite smoothly. I will be doing multiple entries today in order to catch up. The flights to Lima were good. Detroit to Newark smooth, and Newark to Lima we were quite excited to get the emergency row. That is, until we boarded and realized that the emergency row seats do not recline. Ugh. For a 7.5 hour trip not quite as comfortable as one would think. The line to process passports was slow - 45 minutes to pass through, then on to pick up the luggage. I was watching the 3 gates to pass through with luggage - in Lima you push a button - red light means you have to go through a customs search. Green light means you can simply pass through ... read more

On the end of the Armies! Sorry..... We took the bus from Arequipa to Puno on my 30th birthday, which is a pretty rubbish way to spend a birthday, but when you’re depressed about the birthday it‘s pretty irrelevant! Puno is a small, scruffy town at high-altitude (3,900m), and the only real reason to visit is to make a trip on to Lake Titicaca: the highest lake in the World. Indigenous tribes live on the lake, some on ‘floating’ islands made of reeds and others on real islands. We joined a tour group visiting both, and the floating Uros islands in particular were very cool, although the residents now rely on tourists for their living so it feels a little unreal. Taquile (the real island that we visited) was also good, but again the locals have ... read more

Landed in Lima which was shrouded in a depressing damp grey mist. I´m missing sunny Cuzco. Met up with Bernice (Excel alum) at Larcomar which is really touristy and the same kind of shops like ¨Darling Harbour¨, but hanging on the side of a cliff-face facing the Pacific Ocean. Basically been chilling out. I´ve already watched 2 films (X-Men 3, and The Omen) at the local multiplex for about A$3 each. My dorm-mate took me to his fave lunch place, and I had my first ceviche looking out at a view of the ocean with parapenters floating around. Fabulous. He´s going to be away for 18 months, and has been in Lima for a month (what the ....?). Told me that if he was back home in Manchester and offered a girl a drink he´d be ... read more