2009 Dan in Peru

Lima The first thing to know about Lima is that although it’s on the Pacific coast, it’s also in a desert. The second thing is that 9 million people live here, making it roughly the size of Chicago or LA. Like LA, the mountains to the east trap fog and the ambient air pollution from these millions of Peruvians has turned this into smog. The mountains themselves, the foothills of the Andes, crop up abruptly and are completely void of vegetation. That, along with the desert air, reminds one of Phoenix. But drive anywhere in Lima, and satisfaction is guaranteed that we’re not in Kansas anymore. Besides the pollution, there’s the traffic. It’s pretty darn awful. And then there’s the driving. Staying within lanes? Yielding to right-of-way? Watching out for pedestrians? Traffic laws in general? Mere suggestions. The architecture and various businesses are also unique to Peru. I’d had plenty of warning about the crime, including kidnappings. The warnings did give me pause. Maybe I’ve been lucky, but it doesn’t look so bad to me. It helps that I’m in, I think, a fairly safe area. 

The Hotel Golf Los Incas is built into the side of a mountain overlooking a golf course. It’s not far from the office of my client, and in all the driving back and forth, as well as my almost daily running, I haven’t seen anything to be worried about. Not that I’ll take any unnecessary chances, mind you. And my clients, as well as all of the other Peruvians I’ve met, have all been more than gracious. The Historical center of Lima is, in fact, quite historical. Founded by Francisco Pizarro in the 16th century, Plaza Mayor, the main square, hosts the presidential palace, the Lima Cathedral and several other historical buildings. The architecture here and in the surrounding blocks takes us back to the colonial times. There’s also Peruvian music everywhere. On one of the nearby blocks is the Cathedral of San Francisco. Below the cathedral are the famous catacombs, where 30,000 Peruvians were buries. It’s quite a labyrinth. They’ve unearthed the bones, and they’re on display. There’s a lot of them. Back to the Plaza Mayor, and people were lining up on the sides of the roads, so of course I lined up with them. As I suspected, a parade started up. It was a folklore parade, as dozens of groups of dancers, all wearing masks and extremely colorful costumes, came dancing by. Each dancing group was followed by a band, and each band appeared to be playing the same music. Quite the cultural experience for old Dan. My friends from the office, Liliana, Fernando and Fiorella, not to mention Fiorella’s beautiful 5-year old daughter, Rafaella were kind enough to take me to the Gold Museum. Interestingly, there wasn’t a tremendous amount of gold there. The Spanish Conquistadors had plundered most of it. What was left, death masks, chalices and the like, was certainly fantastic however. What there was a lot of, however, was weapons. I’d never seen so many knives, swords and guns of all types. There were also plenty of interesting archeological items. The highlight for me, however, was the mummies. They are extremely well-preserved, and quite fascinating. The nightmares will come later. My running in Lima is chronicaled in my running blog, including my first run in Peru, and other running in Peru, and finally, Running in Peru – My Final Run for the Trip and Sort of a Summary. 

 A couple days before leaving, Liliana and Fernando took Mary and me out to the Miraflores area for an evening. Located above directly on the Pacific, including the sea cliffs above, Miraflores is the tourist and nightlife center of Lima. It is noticeably cooler and more humid that the La Molina and Surco districts where I’ve spent most of my time. The area was quite lively. We had pisco sour drinks (good, but very strong!) at a restaurant in the Larcomar mall, which is built into the sea cliff. What a great evening out. It was wonderful of Liliana and Fernando to spend the time with us. 

 Pacachamac Pacachamac is an archeological site about 20 miles from Lima. I took a tour In order to get there. On the way I got to see some of the districts of Lima that are on the seacoast: Miraflores, Barranco and others. This part of Lima is quite different from the parts that I’d been used to. Here the haze/fog/smog is very noticeable. It hangs just above the ocean, hugging the surrounding sea cliffs. The Pachacamac site itself is, like many of the mountains, completely barren. It appears to be as much a desert as any you could imagine. There are a few somewhat green areas not too far away however – they can get water from a nearby river. This river is where the Incas, and those who preceded them, got their water to live on in Pachacamac, which was a fair-sized city in its time. The Incas who inhabited the area were the final regime/era; there had been three others before them. It turns out that Pachacamac was a god as well as this city, and the central focus is at the Temple of the Sun, which is high on a hill. From there one can see miles of seacoast (even with the fog) and a couple of nearby villages. 

 Well Being Unwell being is more accurate. Don't even think about drinking the water here. I didn't, but I still managed to get deathly ill. It's something I ate (not the water itself), but I'm not sure what. I'd been trying all kinds of new things, especially at the breakfast buffet. I had to see the doctor at the office's clinic. Now I'm on Cipro. It's killing me to not know what did it. Cusco and Machu Picchu Let’s say, just for fun, that you’re in Lima, and that you would like to visit Machu Picchu, the famous Lost City of the Incas. You may think: it’s only a few hundred miles away, and in the same country, so it ought to be easy to do, right? You would be extremely, hilariously, totally wrong. 

 First, you must get to Cusco (also spelled, Cuzco). Cusco, population 350,000, is in the Andes at 11,000 feet, and from Lima, it is 26 hours by car, and 1 hour by air. A long and winding road comes to mind. The cost of the air, we learned, was $430 for Americans and $172 for Peruvians, depending on where you are and what version of the website you use. With some help from Fiorella, I paid the $172. After you arrive in Cusco, you must get a train ($98 R/T) from nearby Poroy to Aguas Calientes. Once in Aguas Calientes, you have to buy a bus ticket ($14 R/T) from there to Machu Picchu. This doesn’t take into account the taxi rides (Lima hotel to airport, airport to Cusco hotel, Cusco hotel to Poroy train station), the need to buy the entry to Machu Picchu whilst in Aguas Calientes ($42), or other general confusion. Oh, and one more consideration: all this takes, at a minimum, three days. One day to get to Cusco, one day for the trains and buses and the visit to the site, and one day to get back to Lima. Not good if you’re on a five-day work week in Lima. But my colleague Mary, who would be my traveling companion on this trip, and I were in luck: Friday, the 1st of May was a holiday and the office would be closed. With the three-day weekend, and the relatively lower airfare, the trip was doable. At least it seemed so before the 3 ½ hour delay and general mayhem getting out of Lima. 

 Arriving in Cusco after being in Lima is akin to arriving in Oz after being in Kansas. The air is crisp, clear and clean, but unfortunately, there’s little of it. I’d been at high altitudes before, but never for more than a few hours. It was after a couple hours that I really did begin to feel the effects: difficult breathing, light-headedness and dizziness. It took the rest of the day, and a nearly sleepless night before I felt ok again. This is good because one would want to feel decent for the next day’s tough trip to Machu Picchu. Despite my difficulties, I just had to get out and walk around Cusco. It’s a beautiful mountain city. After some coca-leaf tea (it really is supposed to help, and is supposedly non-addicting) at our Terra Andina hotel, out I went. I hit the main market area, and that was fun. Crafts, fruits and vegetables, various meats, including whole pigs, various dining options, dogs running around, flies, all kinds of people, you name it, and it is there. The same scene took place on several streets that surround the building as well. Here the fruits and vegetables are very colorful in the sun. Tons of fun for a guy like me. The main square, known as Plaza de Armas, is also very nice. I saw it several times: daytime, nighttime, when it was nicely lit up, and on a Sunday morning, where there was yet another parade. This parade included folklore dancing once again, and was at least as colorful as the one I saw in Lima. Earlier I had seen the costumed groups marching and dancing into the church for Sunday mass. Even dinner in Cusco was memorable. I was tempted to have the guinea pig (they call it cuy), but it was twice as expensive as everything else. I settled for alpaca, and it was great. We had some good conversations with fellow travelers there, including some who would be doing the multiple day hike on the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. I’m going to look into this for next time. 

 The train ride from Poroy to Aguas Calientes has to be one of the most spectacular in the world. For the early part we witnessed scenic farms and a couple villages that were framed by mountains. Then the mountains got serious. They went straight up to impossibly tall heights, sometimes with walls inches from the train cars. We had to pull ourselves into the windows so as not to get our hands chopped off. For other parts of the trip we went along the whitewater rapids of a rushing river that ran between the peaks of the Andes. We even saw the staging area and hikers for the multiple-day hikes of the Inca Trail. Upon our arrival in Aguas Calientes, a mountain village that’s in a beautiful setting and made specifically for tourists, we were greeted by mass confusion. Where to buy the bus tickets? Where to buy the Machu Picchu entrance tickets? Where to hire a guide? What order do we do these things in? Mary and I somehow managed to work it all out and get to Machu Picchu. 

 Machu Picchu was constructed in the 1400’s and abandoned about 100 years later. Although the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire did not include the site – the Spanish never found it – the Incas left nevertheless, perhaps due to disease. The primary buildings are the Intihuatana, the Temple of the Sun, and the Room of the Three Windows. Theories abound as to the purpose of the city. Some of them hold that it was a citadel to control the economy of conquered regions. Others say that it was a home to virgins of the sun, whoever they were, or a prison. Although it was known locally, it was brought to the attention of the modern world by the American explorer Hiram Bingham of Yale University in 1911. It was later named a World Heritage site and voted one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. There is now some concern that too much tourism poses a threat to the site. But then it can help too. We talked to volunteers who were there to clean moss and plants that grow on and between the stones. They sure help the preservation effort. Yes, Machu Picchu is everything it’s cracked up to be. And then some. Of course there was more confusion after getting off the bus and trying to get in. One of the points of indecision was: should we hire a guide? Naaah - $40 or so seemed like just too much. We set off on our own. The map was confusing, so after entering, we just started to climb the high-road path at the first fork. That’s when we saw it. The classic Machu Picchu view. It’s breathtaking. And not just because of the climb we just did. There had been the costs, the travel, the general hassle. But now suddenly it was all worthwhile, just for this one view. Now it was time to climb around all the stone stairs (lots and lots of stairs) and pathways to explore the place. The scale is deceiving; once you enter some of the lower buildings and open areas you realize how huge the site really is. Mary seemed to always know where she was, but I was happy to just wander around and gawk. We did manage to see most of the main stuff, and even relax a bit towards the end. It was later in the afternoon that we saw the llamas. First a mother and her baby, but then more and more. At one point several of them stampeded by us. Although I’d seen everything that I wanted to, it would have been nice to come back the next day. I’m still going to consider that hike. As it was, however, it was time to get back on the bus, and then back on the now uncomfortable train to Cusco. The next day it was back on the plane for Lima, where life would soon return to not so normal. 

The Good and the Bad Although the food was generally very good, with more variety than one can imagine, at some point I became sick from some of it. The drugs cured me of the GI problems, but I also developed a cold during my last couple days in Peru. So I’d have to say that although the Peruvian germs liked me, the feeling was not mutual. Lima is very large, busy and crowded, and at times exciting. The history is fascinating. The pollution and the squalor of the poor tend to detract from it however. Cusco, on the other hand, is a city in a beautiful mountain setting and is just what one might think of when conjuring thoughts of a city in Peru. The market there was very colorful. Machu Picchu is in a category by itself. Finally there is the Peruvian people. They are as gracious as anyone anywhere. Our hosts at the office, Liliana, Juan, Fiorella and Fernando, became great friends, and everyone else we met was congenial and welcoming. This is what I’ll remember best from Peru.