Lima, Peru

                                    Ok, guess which city is the largest (in population) in the Americas and no fair looking it up!

                                    Which one is it?

                                    X ?  

Try again! (Sound of Buzzer going off)

                                    How about XXXXX?

                                       Nope!

                                    Ok, here’s my last guess.. XXXXXXXXX?

                                     Wrong again Ms. Population Nerd!

            Did anyone guess São Paulo in Brazil?

                                   I know that I did not!

            So, if they’re first, who slammed into second place?

                                    Yes, our City of the Day, which is our destination and Port for two days, Lima, Peru.

                                    I never would have guessed that either! The numbers are in and depending on how recent the census is that’s being used, Central and South America take most of the top spots. In fact the top 15 Cities by Population in the Americas has 11 of those positions filled by Central and South American cities.

Who woulda thunk that!

            We had our first Tours by Locals outing yesterday courtesy of Sandra, our local TBL Guide. Yesterday was a bit of an ordeal as Lima has no Cruise Terminal and uses its Container Port to dock visiting Cruise Ships. That is fine until it is time to disembark and visit the city (which is what Cruise Ships do!). No one is allowed in or out of the Port unless “escorted” which means busses need to be used to get folks back and forth and that doesn’t mean just to the Port Gate (It’s in a section of town that could be considered ‘undesirable’) it means that the busses must drive about an hour further into downtown and deposit passengers in a central location. All well and good until you take a look at the traffic! Yikes! I thought that NYC and LA were bad! Nope! They’re a walk in the park compared to Lima!

                        Anyway, we were ready for anything. The Ship does an excellent job of directing the items that are within its control so when the announcement the previous day said that the “First Come/First Served” Tickets for the Shuttle Busses would become available at 6am the next day we (the collective “we” …. Paula stayed in the room to guard the pillows) made sure that we got there in plenty of time to obtain tickets for Bus #1 as we had a Tour to get to. We had no idea how long it would take to traverse the city, but we were told it could be an extra hour and a half! So, getting Bus #1 became imperative if we were to be on time for our 9:30 am Tour start.

                                    Unfortunately I was a little late in getting to the spot on the Ship where the tickets were to be distributed and found that I was only 2^nd in line….. missed 1st by about 9 minutes!  Anyway, Tonya (my new Line Friend) and I spent the next hour and a half waiting until 6am to procure our valuable tickets and informing all of the latecomers that the line started HERE, meaning we were FIRST!

                                    Unfortunately (?) (again) we were informed that everything was running early, and that Bus#1 would be ready to leave soon (!) ….. which means that Paula needed to be informed of our new time parameters and status. It was now around 6:05 am and we were quite sure (the day before) that the buses would not be ready until around 7am…..oops!

                                    At this point you would ask …… “What’s the big deal if you miss Bus #1….. just get on the next one!” …. That would be fine except we were informed that if you missed your original Bus then you needed to start the process over, get back on the Ticket Line and procure a ticket for the next one available and there was no telling when that one would be for.

                                    As Yoda would say… “Successful we were…” and we did get on Bus #1 shortly thereafter. The Bus made its way towards the Port exit along with 14 billion of the 15 billion cars and trucks that are around here. As you may surmise, when trying to get somewhere on time in a foreign port where you are at the mercy of EVERYONE, the BTH Ratio (Bad Things Happening) expands exponentially until it no longer matters because you’re dead in the water anyway. There was a massive traffic jam at the Exit/Entrance to the Port and no one did anything about it except honk a lot of horns. Our Bus Driver must have had a Special Relationship with He who Walks on Water, because somehow we managed to extricate ourselves and at least start to exit the Port. Now all we had to do was navigate the normal (very bad) traffic in the city proper. More Blessings were offered up and somehow or other we managed to get to the Indian Market about two (2!) hours before our scheduled meeting time. We concluded that it was better than two hours late, and the fact that Bus #2 (who left ten minutes after we did) arrived at the Indian Market over 2 hours after we did!) illustrating the fact that the normal Traffic Timelines did not apply here in Lima.

                                    Unfortunately, (3^rd time) this meant that we needed to cool our heels on a bench for that time as most of the stalls in the Market were not open yet. And besides, how many Trinket Shops can one visit before you just go SRM? But here are some pics of the wares that were available!

                                                Fortunately, (Yay! Finally!) we were rescued by Sandra, (our TBL Guide) who quickly whisked us away in our very own Minivan driven by Victor whose driving skills could have qualified him for either Formula 1 or NASCAR, both of which he could have won.

                                    Lima is a friendly city. The vibe is energetic without being raucous. Since we were able to let Sir Victor handle the driving, we were able to admire all of the sights that Sandra pointed out on our way to the first stop of the day. Before we get to that, I should say that Lima is a city that requires far more than one day to fully appreciate. I guess that can be said for most large, international cities and Lima is no different. Sandra did an excellent job of helping us see a cross section of her city which she knew like the back of her own hand. That first stop happened to be a great place to start because it was the perfect place to learn the history and back-culture of the peoples of the past, who are now the peoples of the present. Huaca Pucllana is one of the most interesting archaeological sites that we’ve seen anywhere, and the crazy part is that it’s smack dab in the middle of the city!

As large as this site is, it has been determined that it radiates from this spot, an additional five, fifteen, and forty city blocks in three directions, which makes it quite grand in scope. And it pre-dates the Inca civilization by hundreds of years! Huaca Pucllana’s main pyramid measures about 5400 square yards at the base and around 80’ high and consists of an innumerable amount of adobe bricks.

The crazy part is the amount of rain (or lack thereof) this area gets per year, and you need water in order to make adobe (mud). Here again, poor Lima comes in a close second. This time to Cairo, Egypt as the second driest desert city in the world. Lima’s annual precipitation averages a drop over half an inch per year! It is so inconsequential that there are no storm drains, gutters, or anything like that. Even roofs are used more for shelter from the sun rather than rain. Luckily Lima has three rivers that flow out of the Andes that provide enough water for its 11,000,000+ people.

                                    From there we went a bit more towards the city center. Lima has a main street that has been turned into a pedestrian walk. Union Street is lined with all of the shops and restaurants, etc. that you can think of. It was still early in the day, before 11am when most places here open. Their business hours are from 11am to 11pm.

                                    As mentioned briefly (with respect to Huaca Pucllana and earthquakes) one of the dividing time period markers is the earthquake of 1746 (magnitude 9.0, with an accompanying tsunami of about 80’). There are a few buildings that survived that event and are the only pre-colonization buildings still standing. These are quite evident as they have been granted a special status by the Peruvian government’s Department of Really Old Stuff.

                                    Lunch was had at a great little place, courtyard, a nice Peruvian place with a traditional Peruvian menu, et al. Paula was the brave one, having ceviche (fish) which they say is “cooked” in lime juice, but we all know that it’s really “raw”……

                                                I had some beef.

                                                We had a great time with Sandra getting a chance to talk and compare lifestyles and showing family photos. Sandra brought us to a little place to get some Peruvian coffee and she bought us some Peruvian chocolate!

After lunch and a visit to another historic area of Lima we walked and found Victor and our ride. He mastered his way through cross town traffic until we reached the ocean and the base of Morro Solar, a significant “mountain” right on the coast. A very, very narrow and twisty road led us to the top and some stunning views.

I must admit that one day is far too short a time to master an area. Sandra did a wonderful job in giving us the highlights of both the culture and history of Peru and she was an absolute pleasure to spend a day with. Maybe we can just be happy that we were able to spend a day with someone from Lima who loves and cares enough about her city to show it off to a couple of strangers. 😊