Peru, part 1 – Lima

Lima Cathedral, Plaza de Armas, Lima, Peru

After 11 hours of traveling (which included a 2-hour stopover in the lovely George Bush Intercontinental Airport), we arrived in Lima at about 10 pm local time. Going through immigration and customs was quite simple, although lengthy due to a large number of people arriving at the same time. We were then met by a guide holding a sign with our name on it; the first time I’ve ever seen that for myself, but  in such an unfamiliar situation and with my very limited Spanish, an extremely welcome sight.

Coming out of the airport late that night,  we got to experience Lima’s famous garua, “more than a fog, less than a rain,” a heavy mist that keeps everything slightly wet and cold, and the sky leaden. I never saw the sun once while we were there.

The next day, our guide took us on a whirlwind tour of the city. Many of the streets were blocked off for events like marathon running or some such, so we spent a lot of time in the car stuck in traffic looking for alternate routes. We finally made it to the Plaza de Armas, Lima’s original city center and the home of the Palacio de Gobierno. We arrived in time for the changing of the guards. The presence of la policia is rather overt here, but when I asked our guide if they were expecting a riot, she said go have your picture taken with them. Evidently, they have a pretty good sense of humor, at least for the tourists.

From there, we went on to visit the San Francisco monastery and church, famous for its catacombs containing the bones of tens of thousands of people. I was hoping to start a collection of such visits, as this would be my second after the visit to the ones in Paris (detailed here), but much to my disappointment, they do not allow photography in San Francisco.

After a lovely lunch of local delights at the Restaurant El Bolivariano, our sight-seeing concluded with a visit to The National Museum of Archaeology, Anthropology and History. Then it was back to the hotel for an early dinner and bedtime, as we had to leave the hotel at 3:30 am to fly to Arequipa the next morning.