We are staying in Hotel Antigua Miraflores, which is in Miraflores, a suburb of Lima. The hotel is very quaint with heavy wooden furniture, Latin American tiled bathroom, and a window that looks out onto a little courtyard around which the hotel is built.
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| Out our window |
We got up this morning a little after 7 and went down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast (included with the room). Breakfast was rolls, tea, juice, and eggs cooked to order. After breakfast, we spent some time planning what we wanted to do in Lima for the two days we are here. It seemed like a lot more time in Lima when we were plannning our trip, but they moved our flight to Cuzco from the afternoon to the morning, so we have a lot we want to see in a short time.
We started out by taking a taxi to the Museo de Larco. In this museum, they display and document many of the artifacts of the pre-Columbian cultures of Peru. (Larco was a wealthy activist who collected artifacts and identified some of the previously undocumented earlier, pre-Incan civilizations.) There were lots of great ceramics, textiles, and metal works (gold, silver, and copper) from that time period. The grounds of the museum themselves are gorgeous with lots of plants and lots of bougainvillea on the walls around the property. Every building here seems to have a guard at the door. The gates to the grounds are closed, but when we walked up, the guard opened the gate to let us in.
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| On the grounds of Museo Lorca |
The artifacts are pretty amazing. Here's a collection of gold nose ornaments worn by Moche elites.
The last section we went to was the storage area where shelf after shelf of artifacts were stored. It's strange to see how many there were. In the museum, you get the feeling these are rare, one-of-a-kind artifacts. In the storage room, it seemed there were so many of some things there was hardly space for them.
After we finished with the museum (and the gift shop), we had lunch at the museum restaurant. It was very fancy and on an open porch off the museum courtyard that is filled with blooming plants, ferns, and succulents. Sandra had a dish that had Peruvian yellow potatoes layered on the top and bottom and layers in between of a shrimp filling and avocado. I had a corn and beef pie which was a meat filling (a bit spicy with raisins) and a corn pudding-type dough on top and bottom.
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| Sandra is wearing a wool flower we bought at the gift shop |
The bathrooms at the museum are all marked with anatomically correct figurine replicas of some of the pre-Columbian ceramics. Here's one from the women's room at the restaurant.
After lunch we decided to walk to our next destination: El Parque de la Reserva. Our apps had said it should take us about an hour to walk. We are using an app called "Pocket Earth." It allows you to mark routes and such while connected to the internet, but while you are not connected, it still locates you on the map using gps. So unlike imaps or google maps, you can view the map and your location without wifi or cell, plus any routes or points you have saved.
We started out walking and enjoyed getting to view the city at this less frantic pace (the cabs drives have all been wild and death-defying). When we had walked almost an hour and thought we should be getting there soon, we got worried and asked a policeman who was standing on the corner to make sure we were going in the right direction. He didn't seem to understand what I was talking about, didn't recognize the name of the park or my Spanish describing the park. So he called another policeman who spoke English (he grew up in New Jersey). But he didn't know about the park either. So at least is wasn't my Spanish that was the problem! I was pretty sure "fuentes" meant fountains (the park has 13 fountains). He finally called someone on his walkie-talkie who knew where the park was. We were headed in the right direction, but still had a ways to go. He wanted to call us a cab, but we were still determined to walk it.
We finally made it to the park. We had to walk another 10 minutes around the perimeter to find the entrance. So in all it took us almost an hour and a half (including the time talking to the police). I guess it's slower walking when you have to stop for traffic and such.
The park is very beautiful with 13 different fountains: some formal, some you can walk through or stand in without getting wet, and others where in the summer kids can play in them. Even though it's winter here, it's pretty warm and humid (high today around 75). (I know that's not hot for you all in TX, but it's hot for us Seattle-ites.) So walking among the fountains was quite pleasant and cool. The fountain Sandra is standing in front of below shot water up in different dramatic ways.
We took a cab home--another death-defying ride with lots of honking for extra fun this time. Our hotel had called the cab we took to the museum and had also told the cab driver how much to charge (you have to negotiate the charge before you get in the cab), so we knew how much it should cost to go back. The cab driver offered to take us for 30 soles (about $10), but we offered what we paid before (S/ 17). Another cab pulled up behind right then, so the driver accepted our offer.
We were exhausted from our long walk when we got back. We rested a bit and then went down to the hotel bar to try our first Pisco Sour, the classic Peruvian cocktail. Ricardo, the bar tender, taught us how to make it: three parts Pisco, one part egg whites, one part lemon juice, and one part simple syrup. Then he blended it with 3 ice cubes, strained it and poured it in a chilled glass and put a drop of bitters on top. He said it was important to use a queda glass (I think that's the name he used). It's about the size of an old fashioned glass, only narrower at the bottom and wider at the top.
I really liked the drink. It was light and foamy and not too sweet. Sandra had the same only made with passion fruit infused Pisco. It was delicious as well.
After our Pisco sours, we went back to our room and rested until dinner at 6:30. We were so tired from our walk and relaxed from our drinks that we both took a short nap. We had dinner at the restaurant in the hotel. Sandra had an Asian/Peruvian fusion dish with rice and shrimp and I had steak and rice, both very good.
Then we played dice until early bedtime.
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