The Return to Lima

What I thought was going to be a lazy, laid-back day turned out to be slightly more eventful than predicted. Although I didn't have any time to get pictures uploaded, I've done a variety of things I'll write about here.

For the second day this trip, I got to sleep in until about 8:30. After taking the time to take a good shower, brush teeth, and pack our bags, my family had some breakfast in our Cusco hotel. By about 10AM, we were ready to go out into the city of Cusco for the last time. Since our taxi to the airport would arrive at the hotel at around 11:30, we only really had an hour in the city. To spend this time nicely, we decided to explore an area of Cusco that we haven't yet been to.

After walking onto one of the roads we never followed from the main plaza, we ended up in what seemed to be Cusco's contemporary financial district. Although it doesn't match the kind of financial district you'd see in a large city, you could still tell that the buildings were newer and were built with a lot of money. By the time we walked back to the main square from this area, it was already time to walk back to the hotel to catch the airport taxi.

The 20 minute taxi ride brought us to Cusco's airport, probably the least advanced I've ever flown through. You could see the airport baggage crew taking your bags after checking them in, the boarding passes were printed on receipt paper, and the PA system at gates was a guitar amplifier. At 1PM, our flight began to board, and by 1:40 we were in the air.

I'm not usually afraid of flying, but the flight from Cusco back to the Peruvian capital of Lima definitely made me nervous at a few points. Because Cusco is situated in a flat, low area surrounded by several mountains, the climb from the airport has to be really steep and requires the plane to make sharp banks while rising so it doesn't crash into a mountain. There was very little room for error, so every little bump of turbulence made me slightly nervous. Fortunately, after about 20 minutes, the frightening ascent was over and the flight continued normally. By 4PM, we were back in our Lima hotel where we spent about an hour catching up with work/email and planning the rest of our day.

Our first destination in Lima, which has been very cloudy for the last few days, was the Chala restaurant in the shoreside Barranco district. As we descended Lima's coastline cliff on Bajada de Banos, a cobblestone street reminiscent of the Monciak in Sopot, Poland, we failed to find the famous Chala in a sea of restaurants. We did, however, get a beautiful view of of the Pacific Ocean and Lima's cliff at the bottom of the street. We could even see the Larco Mar shopping center in the distance. On our way back up the street, we watched more carefully to find Chala, and actually did find it. The only problem was, the restaurant wouldn't open until 8PM, which was almost 3 hours away.

The backup restaurant that we decided to go to instead was Canta Rana, deeper in Barranco. This characteristically Peruvian restaurant, with its walls covered in memorabilia from famous visitors (including Paul McCartney), and its large open doorway to the outside street had a very authentic feel. While my father had a delicious meal of goat meat, I got a "barbeque" chicken meal that was mediocre at best. Despite the okay (and overpriced) food, the atmosphere made up for our complaints. If I were to eat there again, I would definitely order something more Peruvian (such as goat meat) so that I wouldn't be stuck with a generic, non-exotic, bland meal.

After stocking up on some water and snacks for the next few days at a supermarket next to the restaurant, we hailed a taxi to take us to the large park in the newly developed area of the city by the National Stadium. There, a landfill was transformed into a beautiful park with 15 unique fountains, each with their own little water movements, lights, and music.

Our plan at this park was to watch the special light/laser show at 8PM, which we assumed would occur at the largest fountain, but we were wrong. After we scouted out the entire park for a perfect view of the massive central fountain, we waited for the show to start. Before we knew it, 8PM had passed and nothing happened. We started to think that there was actually possibly no show at all and that the fountains themselves were the "show," but we were determined to see something.

Sure enough, a light show started at 8:15, but at the slightly smaller fountain adjacent to the one we were sitting near. We quickly ran to this other fountain, where there was a much larger crowd as well as a large set of loudspeakers in front. Fortunately, the crowds weren't so bad and we got a pretty decent view of the 20 minute laser/light show. For these 20 minutes, we gazed at these fountains as the water jets sprayed vertical blasts synchronized with the playing music, a huge movie projector projected videos of Peruvian dancers in the mist produced by the fountain, and lasers created interesting shapes and patterns in the same mist. I was quite surprised at how high-tech this show was, and definitely think that it was worth the 4 soles ($1.50) entrance fee. It's attractions like these that are built with the intent of cleaning up dirty or undesirable areas that will help bring more tourists to the country of Peru.

Immediately after this show ended, we took a taxi back to our hotel where my whole family laid back and tried to relax after the long, not-so-lazy day. Tomorrow, after hopefully sleeping in again, we'll visit one of Lima's top history museums, and then possibly the ruins of mud pyramid that predates the Incans in Peru. Now that we've finished our sidetrip to Cusco and Machu Picchu, the rest of the trip should be relatively easygoing as we approach our return trip to the US on Saturday evening.