Hace mucho calor y estamos muy cansados en la ciudad de Lima, Peru

I have been learning Spanish (using Duo Lingo and Babbel) for almost 18 months, and I was very pleased to realized that, to my surprise, I do understand a lot of Spanish!  In fact, I can read it almost fluently, and if people speak slowly (which they don't!), I understand a lot too.  But I have had little opportunity to try speaking it yet, because so far, almost everyone I’ve interacted with spoke better English than I speak Spanish.

But - look at the title of this blog! Impressed??

It has been a hot and tiring day in Lima.  If fact, it started tired.....

Our flight left NYC at 10:25 pm, and arrived in Lima at 6 am.  Joe and I shared 3 seats, which is not awful, so I squeezed in a couple hours sleep (I don’t think Joe slept at all).  We were lucky, because we were one of the first flights of the day, and got out of the plane quickly, because the line was starting to get really long at immigration - because Peru got it’s first case of Corona virus 2 days ago - AND THEY ARE FREAKING OUT!!!!!!!

So they do what airports do with all kind of other threats:  put protocols in place that make life A LOT harder for travelers, without actually getting rid of the risk (like making my then 89 year old mother take her boots off last time she came to visit....  she is a dangerous woman, but not that way.....).

So anyway- what they did is:  the immigration officer would - very slowly- look though everyone’s passport to figure out if they had traveled someplace scary.  If yes, they would close their line, and personally accompany that person to another long line, where people in all kind of medical gear would take the person’s temperature.  While the agent was away - that line was dead....  about 1/2 the people were sent to the medical team. But the really amazing part is that everyone (including the people suspected of carrying the Corona virus) got to use the same touch screen to get all ten of their finger prints- without anyone wiping the screen once!!!!!!

Well, for once I was grateful for hand sanitizer.....

The line took 1 1/2 hours..... but at least, our bags were ready for us when we got out......  but we still needed a small and frantic detour to the LATAM baggage desk because.....  I F@#$!ING FORGOT A BAG IN THE PLANE!!!!!!!  Like - really!!!!!!! How often do I have to do that before they put me in a home????????? (At least this time, my passport was not in it.... but my malaria pills, which are sort of important for the rest of this trip were....).

The good people at LATAM had found it when cleaning the plane, and it was waiting for me at the desk.....  I almost kissed the young woman who gave it to me, but - you know.... Corona virus, etc...

Joe had booked an extra night at the airport hotel - which when he did I thought was wasteful, since we would not sleep there.  I was wrong.  Being able to cross the street, go into the room, take a nice shower, have a very nice (included) breakfast was worth every dime. 

At breakfast, the waiter gave me this delightful little plate and told me" It's for international women's day" (which he had to repeat twice because he had a very strong accent - but isn't that adorable?)

 We only have one day here, so we asked the hotel if they could arrange a tour, and - for a very reasonable amount of money- we had a private guide who took us around the city.  We started in the oldest part of the city.  Having now visited 3 South America capitals (Buenos Aires, Quito and now Lima), I have to reluctantly be impressed by the Spanish conquistadors...

  The amount of Spanish uniformity they brought to an entire continent - without planes or heavy equipment is- while depressing and wrong in a lot of ways- also awe inspiring. 

The main square, the churches, the convents, are almost interchangeable (not 100%- for instance there is a lot  more gold in Quito) - and in a good way. 

All the cities are pretty, well organized, with pretty side streets (which got a lot busier as the day went one) and have survived the chaotic history of South America nicely.
So - bottom line:  Lima is a pretty city, which  mostly reflects it's Spanish heritage and has lost most of the previous civilization's look- and that's a bit sad too.

But the balconies, typical of the colonial era, are really cool.

 And so are the other, many and varied types of architecture that came later on.

It's also very clean, feels safe in the neighborhoods we went to, and has what looks like a very good public transportation system.  Some of it is in disrepair- but - honestly - more than Queens near JFK??
Short history:  Incas took over from the previous civilization around 1350, Spaniards came about a century later.  Peru declared independence in 1822, took a couple of wars for that to take, but it did eventually around 1844.
Now, looking at people on the street, it is a nicely integrated (if struggling) society.  I think we can learn a lot from Peru.
The old city, on a Sunday is mostly enjoyed by the locals, with street vendors and performers, and the obligatory South American political demonstration.  It's very nice.

The most interesting place we visited was St. Francis Monastery and it's "catacombs". These are not technically catacombs, but an underground cemetery, where about 30,000 people have been buried over the centuries- I've never heard of anything like it - lots of bones!!!! (but no pictures allowed, which is too bad, because it was cool and the church itself was very beautiful - although so similar to the one in Quito, you could just go back and look at those pictures....).  I would particularly have liked to show a picture of the large "Last Super" mural, which was painted around 1610 and had been enhanced to attract the locals to the new religion.  So the last meal included potatoes, chili peppers, and even - as a centerpiece- a guinea pig!

After the old city, we drove through the posh neighborhood of Miraflores, with it's cool condos and hip restaurants: think Brooklyn, but with a REALLY pretty park over looking the Pacific ocean.  We just stopped for a couple of minutes, which was too bad.

I loved that place- and  was thinking about paragliding off the cliff (they had people doing that!).

 But then we went to the next cool neighborhood- Barranco- like Miraflores- but more artsy, and with really pretty beaches! (I don't have an appropriate NYC analogy for that one...)

I would have LOVED to go back to the hotel, put on a bathing suit, taken a dip in the pacific ocean, watched the surfers, and then had dinner at one of the many pretty restaurants that dot the coast.
But - reread the first paragraph- we had by then been up - and walking in very warm weather - for a very long time (it was in fact only about 81 degrees, but humid and dusty....),

so we went back to the hotel where we enjoyed a very nice pisco sour (or two....  I could get used to those).... and an early dinner at the bar.  It was pleasant, good- and considerably cheaper than JFK.
Tomorrow, we are off the the Amazon!!!!  I don't think we'll have wifi there..... so it may be a while till I upload anything......