Tourists

---

With accomodation now sorted, we dried off and decided it was time to start exploring properly. Thankfully, the rain held off as we took the ferry past the Statue of Liberty and then went to check out Ground Zero, which is still just a building site. The Museum of Modern Art has free entry on a Friday afternoon so we braved the queues to see their impressive collection that includes Picasso, Van Gogh and Warhol. We eventually tracked down a bar to have some food and a couple of Bud Lights before our lack of sleep caught up with us and we headed back for an early night.

The next day it was sunny so we had a much more pleasant exploration of Central Park than our first experience. We spent most of the day being typical tourists, visiting Times Square, New York Public Library and the Empire State Building.

We needed to be at the airport by 5am the next morning for our flight to Lima. The hotel clerk, David, was very helpful in arranging a shuttle service for us which we decided would be easier than navigating the long subway trip with all our bags. When we got picked up at 3:30am he was being equally helpful to another couple who were checking into the hotel, allowing them to pay for the room by the hour.

This flight left about half an hour late, and we were a little worried as we only had a 40 minute transfer in Bogota, but fortunately the pilot put his foot down and we made it in plenty of time. They also served us some rather tasty Club Colombia beer - our first South American beers of the trip.

We arrived in Lima pretty shattered, and as a result got pretty ripped off by one of the official airport taxi companies. We didn't care too much though as we arrived at our hostel, and not only was it still up and running, but the owner, Quíque, was incredibly friendly and helpful. He even lent us some Peruvian currency so we could get dinner without having to locate an ATM.

The taxi ride had given us our first experience of South American traffic which is pretty hectic. Most of the cars look pretty beaten up and old, and a lot of the buildings are pretty run down as well. The area where we were staying is fairly well off and safe, and we found dinner in a large, modern mall just down the road that is built impressively into the cliffs overlooking the ocean.

---