Peru - The Border to Trujillo

---

Peru - The Border to Trujillo

We arrived into Peru early and groggy from the over night bus journey as the driver had managed to save an hour of the 8 hour journey because he also drove like his life depended on it. Our first impression of Pêru was in Piurra and we thought what the feck. A mad main street with buses, taxis and everysingle one of them stopping to beep the horn ask if we wanted a cab. We used the internet after a slight mishap and then borded a 3 hour bus for Chicloyo the first of many Spanish dubbed, Spanish subtitled films.

We managed to get a a decent meal in the city which featured sangria, lots of meat and we think an animals small intestine, but no chicken foot in asite for this meal, so we were happy 

Deciding to squeeze a few bus journeys into 2 days to get from Ecuador to our Peruvian destination we boarded another bus bound for Trujillo, for a further 3 hours. We watched the desert like scenery role by and the flat pacific coast, with some ignorant people in front of us who had fully reclined there seat for the entire journey and sprawled there arms back into our laps.

After making the mistake in Costa Rica of accepting the first accommodation we saw, we decided to wander the streets for an hour and scope out the best deal as we were staying for 3 nights. After much deliberation we returned to a nice Hotel for what we believed was a really good rate, only to be shafted over in a few days time!

A good nights sleep at last and a breakfast the next morning returned us to near normality. We decided to get out for the full day and had a days tour of local Chimu and Moche ruins. Not up to the grandure of Karnak or Giza but the pictures and burial reliefs were well kept after being buried in sand for over a thousand years. We toured the Sol and Luna temples in the morning and the once largest adobe (baked mud) city in the world, Chan Chan in the afternoon. Very little in the way of artifacts here or in the museum as the place had been raided by grave robbers, then conquering Incas, then finally by the Spanish Conquistadors.
We finally finished the Day on the surfing coastal town of Huanchaco watching the surfers catch some huge waves. A full days sight seeing led us to splash out on a nice Italian meal and some Chilean wine as we thought we had done our duty to the chicken and rice trade.

A day of sight seeing of churches and cathedrals in the city led us to going into the Trujillo cathedral museum and the catacombs. Some fantastic 300 + year old religious paintings tucked away in a dark corner of the world. To add to the atmosphere Matt decided to climb behind a dark wall and jump out on Jo who screamed her head off, prompting the museum guard to come and investigate, all the while we could hear Monks chanting in the hall above. Matt tried to say that Jo had let out a blood curdling scream because she had tripped but we don’t think he was buying the story, so we promptly left.

That evening we found that the Trujillo theater had a free concert featuring a brass ensemble from Lima and a local orchestra. They played some great classical pieces in a lovely theater, ranging from classical composers, to some Jazz and finally finishing on a surprising classical rendition of Michael Jacksons Thriller. Definitely not what we were expecting from Peru so far.

Our Final day started well with an argument at the Hotel as when we came to leave they said had not paid all the bill even though we paid the total amount when we arrived... But they claimed they had quoted us in $ not in Peruvian Soles so the price tripled.. 2 hours later and some assistance from the tourist office who could speak English and Spanish finally sorted it out.

We killed some time in the city but we were ready to leave. At 9 we got our over night VIP bus to Huaraz with fully reclining leather chairs and a plane style meal served, plus our first film with English subtitles.

---