Lima

Lima, The Peruvian capital, a bussling hot spot for many travellers just beginning their travels, most of which take the so-called ¨gringo trail¨ south down the coast north to Cuzco then into Bolivia through Puno and Lake Titicaca.

This is the the exact trail that I will be following, and have already met many other travelllers doing that same, either at different speeds or in opposite directions.

I arrived late in Lima on Monday the 7th of November. Ther hostel which I was staying in, Hotel Espana, was to be picking me up there. As soon as I came out of the checked zone into the pick-up area there were hundreds of people gathered waiting. Many were family but a large amount, to my suprise were for hotels and hostels. I immediately thought ¨this is not going to be easy¨I asked on Hotel Espana to one of the airport assistants and he immediately pointed in a direction towards the throng, following his movement a short,excited peruvian jumped into the air above the rest with his ¨hotel espana¨sign above his head, almost as if he had been picked for something extraordinary! On our ride to the hostel his sub-par vehicle randomly turned off on the road and he casually pulled it over to the left lane, as if it was a normal occurance. Waiting in Lima, at mid-night alone in a car, first hour in the city, a rather run-down part of the city at that. I was not too thrilled.

I was exhausted by the time we arrived at 1 AM when we both found out that I was not the one that he was supposed to pick up ¨You´re not Ricardo¨the man at the desk said. We all laughed and I went to bed. I never ended up finding out what happened to Ricardo.


I do not have an incredibly large amount to say about Lima. It was interesting to see the Industrial, ¨developped¨side of Peru although anyone from a 1st world country would quickly realize that this development was pretty shoddy. Lima is an enormous city, most of which I did not see, and was not inspired to attempt to see. People are everywhere, alway, and taxi´s dominate the city streets easily by 70 percent. The city has constant noise, all day and night. All driver´s honk their horns at basically anything that moves including themselves, at least 3 or 4 times per occasion. Its almost like a form of communication, a language of its own. The weather is generally poor in Lima, cloudy most of the time, accumpanied by smog, from the great amounts of polution. The monuments are not exciting and I was not interested much in visiting museums, I spent the 3 days wandering the streets, meeting people for temporary amounts of time and trying to get over my cold.There were cops everywhere downtown at all hours of the day, expecially around the Government Palace. I was awoken more than once by demontrations in the street by citizens.

I was looking forward to leaving Lima when I did on the 11th. I misread my watch in the morning and thought I was late making me rush to the bus station only to find out half way there that I had 2 hours to kill. The joys of travelling. Leaving Lima was an eye-opener, The poverty that was on the outskirts of the city and around the area was immense. Buildings unsuitable for living were built into the walls of mountains and hills. The lack of vegetation was noticeable as the bus brought me closer to Paracas and the desert. The skin of the townspeople changed as well and became more of a red-ish, maroon colour, never have I seen this, likely from years from living under those conditions and in that area. It was full of eye and mind opening sights to say the least.