Wednesday, May 20, 2015
Lima, Peru is an unusual place. ‘The City of Kings’ is a desert located on the Pacific Ocean but the air is heavy with humidity and overcast most of the time with slight variations in temperature. We were told, “It never rains in Lima. Just a drizzle.” I thought of Coleridge: “Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink.”
Today was our day to explore the Miraflores District so we walked to Avenue Larco, the main commercial street, and followed it as far as Parque Central.
Heavy traffic clogged the avenue and very few street lights made crossings a challenge. There were numerous banks and each one had an armed guard posted outside the door wearing a bulletproof vest. Familiar fast food restaurants were all represented.
An interesting fact about Lima is that most of the buses were privately owned. The city recently instituted a public transportation system so there are designated bus stops and city buses now. We saw a wide variety of buses in many different sizes, colors, and exterior decorations.
The Park Central aka Kennedy Park was lovely with exotic trees and flowers but was overrun with cats. The cat in the photo above seemed to be hunting for birds.
We found El Museo del Cacao y Chocolate on Calle Berlin but unfortunately the workshop wasn’t in operation. We tasted cacao tea and bought a variety of small chocolates to taste.
We had a delicious lunch in a Peruvian restaurant called Tanta and sampled a couple of traditional foods. Papas Rellenas and Aji de Gallina pictured below:
It was fall here south of the equator so the days are getting shorter. The sun set at 5:50 pm today. We explored the neighborhood around the hotel and then prepared for our big day tomorrow when we meet the people on our tour and begin to see more of Peru.
