Lima, day 2

We had an orientation meeting last night, and met Leo, our guide, who seemed very friendly and knowledgable. I also met the rest of the group: Tom and Alison from Tazmania (but they've been living in Canada), Karen and Peta, also from Australia, Steve and Claire, from Canada, and Owen and Lorraine, from New Zealand (Christchurch in fact, they're still suffering from the earthquake). Along with me, Katie and Slade that makes 11.

Leo showed us to a nice restaurant, where I had wild boar, hen, and plantain on rice. It was delicious, but I couldn't eat it all since I had had a late lunch.

We got up early, and had breakfast where I tried an unusual, and as yet in identified fruit which tasted half way between a melon and a potato (Update, it was a sweet cucumber according to Leo. It didn't look anything like a cucumber, but there you go). I have a photo on my camera, so I can't upload it unfortunately. We then has a bus trip around Lima, with an excellent guide called Teresa who told us about Lima's history. Apparently Lima only has 0.7 cm of rain a year, and is the second direst city in the world, so all the houses have flat roofs, and when it does rain it can cause problems.

Lima is also a city of dogs. Everyone seems to have a dog, and many just roam the streets, though all seem friendly. It's very different to other places I've been to, where you only see cats wandering around.

We saw the ocean, which is green because of a lot of phytoplankton, and various parks and districts of the city: the olive park in a rich district whose name I can't remember, the Lovers park in Miraflores, overlooking the ocean, Baraccas (I think), which is the bohemian district, and an Inca (again I think) fortification which had been buried by the Inca themselves as they were conquered to protect it, and has only recently been found. All the photos I took are on one of my cameras so I can't upload any.

It's about midday here, and we are about to head out to the seaside town of Paracas, which is 4 hours away by coach.

Lima, day 1

The taxi transfer from the airport was brilliant, a man had one of those little boards with my name on, and I got to the hotel in short order. I checked in and went up to my room, only to find my key wouldn't turn! I then, still carrying my huge rucksack, went back down for help. A man came up with me, and contemptuously turned the key easily and opened the door.

After 25 hours of travel I wasn't up to much but bed, so I set my alarm for breakfast and crashed out in a lovely, if slightly ageing room.

I woke up *before* my alarm amazingly, and had a shower before breakfast. By chance I happened to meet one of the people on my tour at breakfast, who had also arrived yesterday. She is called Katie, from Australia, and we decided to have a walk around central Lima since we don't have anything to do until the orientation meeting at 6pm. When I got back to my room I once again tried to open the door, and once again failed. This time a cleaner came to my rescue. I asked her to show me how to open it 3 times, but just couldn't get it! 

My roommate Slade, also from Australia, was in the room, so we all went out together for a wander. We are only a block away from the square with the cathedral, and the president's palace, so we just walked around wherever took our fancy. Nobody even threatened to mug us (the government's advice about peru makes it sound like you will be mugged on every corner in Lima) but it probably wouldn't matter if they had, as Slade runs a mixed martial arts dojo for his job.

We have just come back to the hotel for Slade to get settled, Katie to charge her phone, and me to blog, and are planning on going out for some food in a bit.

Edit: Katie and I walked round a bit more, as Slade wanted to use the wifi. We went  to the culture park, and court of justice which is apparently a copy of the one in Brussels. There were some good statues outside the court, and we both got pictures riding a llama statue after we saw some locals doing it. We then went for some food, and since it was getting on decided to share 2 courses, which cost us a grand total of 8.5 soles (about £2), with a drink of some sort of lukewarm lemon tea with sugar included (they like things lukewarm here. I don't, but oh well(

The cathedral (and me)

Inside. It's Sunday so there was a service, and the singing was lovely.

And archeological site that was just tucked out of the way off one of the streets.

Some guards were doing a parade thing in front of the presidential palace.

A Liman street

Atlanta

I had a very mixed experience in customs in Atlanta. Some of the people couldn't do enough for you, but others were very rude. When I asked if I needed to remove my kindle from my bag the woman I asked said "oh my god, why does nobody listen. Of course you leave your kindle in your bag" as if it was the most stupid question in the world. Nobody had mentioned anything at all about kindles, so that wasn't exactly welcome. The guy at immigration didn't speak beyond "left hand four fingers on the scanner" etc, and handed back my passport very slowly, as if he really didn't want to let me in.

On the plus side the airport itself is lovely, with huge seats at my gate, and little collages of Atlanta history all around the place to look at which are quite interesting. I think I may just have a nap now though, I barely got any sleep on the plane from London, though the people either side of me did, which meant I had to wait ages to get out, but the food was nice.

There is no wifi here, so I will have to upload this when I get to lima.

Heathrow

I'm writing this segment from heathrow, as I can't bring myself to do much else this early in the morning. I was unfortunately reminded why I prefer there to be only one half past five in my day when I had to get up this morning!

Terminal 4 seems to be approximately one million miles away from the rest of Heathrow, but after some nervy moments we ended up arriving precisely on time! Check in and security was very quick, literally not a single person in front of me in either queue. Since then I got a coffee at Costa (medium americano, but served in what was essentially a soup bowl), played a little on my ds, and was gouged by WH Smith for some glacier mints and water (£4.50 for both!)

All in all not very exciting, but it will get more so, I promise!

I am to board shortly, and also you only get wifi for 45 minutes, so I will check in again at Atlanta.

No photos this time, it is a misty morning, and I look like I only got 5 hours sleep...

Intro

Due to literally some demand I will be blogging my adventures in the land of everyone's favorite marmalade eating bear: Peru.

The highlights of my tour include trekking the inca trail to Macchu Picchu, a homestay with an Amantani family on a floating reed island on Lake Titicaca, condor viewing in Colca Canyon, and staying in a jungle lodge in the Amazon rainforest.

You may notice that lots of these places sound like they may not have wifi, so unfortunately I doubt I will be able to update this every day, but I will do my best. I will only have my iPhone with me to upload things, but hopefully I can manage to put photos in at least. If not you will just have to imagine!

At this point I really don't have a lot of exciting things to write about, since I haven't actually done anything yet, so I will give over until the journey begins.

(A quick update to make sure I can put photos in adequately: here is a nice picture of the sunset from my train down to London)