Lima

Plaza de Armas
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Lima - I heard so much about Lima and mostly is wasn´t any good, so I wasn´t sure what to expect from the Capitol City of Peru ... but whatever people say about Lima, I personal liked the city! Of course, it has it´s bad areas, but let´s face it, every big city has its good and bad neighbourhoods ... and the main place (Plaza de Armas) has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNISCO.

I arrived around 6 AM in Lima and when I got of the bus I was just tired. I walked into the bus terminal to find out where exactly I want to stay and suddenly Alex was standing in front of me ... I mean, Lima is a city of 10 Million people and we are meeting in a bus terminal of one bus organisation (there are at least 20) at 6 AM in the morning. He just arrived from the North and I came from the South ... the backpacker world is really small!!

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Of course, we decided to stay in the same hostel and there was a Polish couple (they were in the same bus as Alex) and they gave us the tip to look for a hostel in Barranco (a district south of the city and very wealthy - it is kind of weird, that I, the price conscious traveler, get a hostel in on of the best parts of town). We took the bus down there and found a nice hostel - even the people there were not really communicative ;-) ... but well ...) ... we arrived there at 7 AM and we even got a free breakfast ... and it was good ... they had yummy rolls and the best strawberry jam I had in a long time :-) ...

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After breakfast we walked on the promenade of the Ocean (well, you can see, the location of this area isn´t bad at all) to another fancy district named Miraflores ... it is amazing what kind of houses there were build right next to the ocean - I would say, that the cream a la cream lives in these districts. When we arrived in Miraflores I felt like I was back in the States. McDonald's, Burger King, Dominions Pizza, Starbucks, Dunkin´ Donuts, Radio Shake ... named it ... crazy! Alex went to his Airlines and rebooked his flight to Cusco to the same date I had my flight ... so we both will go to Cusco Friday morning (original he wanted to fly Saturday morning), but we booked with different Airlines, so his flight will be an half an hour earlier.

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We always took the bus to the city of Lima and explored the city by foot for two days ... it has beautiful buildings and I love that they have a pedestrian zone and the Plaza de Armas is just amazing :-). Every day at 12 PM there is a procedure of changing of the guards and one day we were watching this spectacular. They had a live band, and everything was very ceremonious. While we were watching it, a local woman approached us. She is learning English in a night school and appreciates every opportunity to speak English. Marilu jointed us for a day, which was very nice. Before we went to the Museo de la nacion (Nactional Museum) Marilu wasn´t sure if she needs an ID so we went to her house. She lives with her cousins, uncle and aunt in a small house near the center and it was interesting to have a opportunity to get into a private house. The Nactional Museum was really great and if you ever make it to Lima it is absolutely a must! We also went to a little museum about the torture technique of the Spanish - bitter! Lima has also a Chinatown, but I was really disappointed, there were hardly any ¨real¨ Chinese people.

By the way, we walked into the Polish couple and the Spanish girl we met at the ruins of Kuelap - I am telling you, it is a small world!

At night we were real party animals ... we stayed up until around 10:30 ... gosh, we were tired :-) ... I need to stop doing this night buses .. .they are killing me, because I hardly can sleep ... one night Alex and I went to the night scenery of Barranco, and as soon as we showed up there we were approached from every club ... that can be soooooo annoying!!!! So we just turned around (I don´t think we even had a beer somewhere) and went home. Well, that´s live :-)

The last night in Lima we stayed in the hostel for a little bit and at 11:00 PM a taxi brought us to the airport. Since I was flying with LAN Peru I was able to check in my backpack immediately. We had a Donut and found comfortable seats, chitchat with an Australian guy and on the spur of the moment it was time to check in (5:00 AM). Cusco (or Gringo town), we are coming :-)