A Lima kind of day

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Stay in Lima or not? This is what we found ourselves asking as we arrived in the Civa bus terminal around 12 on Friday afternoon. Lima is the capital of Peru and is home to over 7million people making it the largest city in Peru -- by ALOT. Arriving in a big city is quite different than many of the smaller towns we´ve been in the past few weeks because asking a cab driver to drop us off ´in the center of town´ to find a hostel just doesn´t work. So as not to end up in an undesirable part of town, we decided to go to the Gringo Heartland aka Miraflores district for the night. Hostal Pradera Verguna welcomed us with open arms and we quite enjoyed being in the nicest hostel yet.

A walking tour of Miraflores included:

Iglesia de la Virgin Milagrosa - a church from 1939 designed by Polish architect and sits along Parque Kennedy

Ricardo Palma´s house - apparently a famous Peruvian author

Instituto Cultural Peruano Norteamericanom - a photo exhibition that we unknowingly snuck into

Huaca Pucllana ruins - very cool! built around 200AD and abondoned around 700AD, the ruins were built of sun-dried bricks by the peoples of Lima Culture as a ceremonial center and meeting place. it has continued to be excavated since 1967 with tombs and mummies still being uncovered

Bosque El Olivar - an olive tree park in the middle of town started in 1560 now with over 1,500 trees

Sunday. Made it down to the Clifftops and then the beach to watch the surf and surfers. The visibility off the coast here is about 100 yards before everything disappears into the mist and haze. Lots of surf lessons going on. The beach is all rocks and no sand to be seen. Had our first taste of a Peruvian chain restuarant, Rustica. The waitress in her head-to-toe skintight, jean jumpsuite was awesome. Wondered around the central Parque Kennedy, a bookstore, PlazaVea our favorite grocery, and back to the hostel to gather things for our bus to Huaraz tonight.

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