Our Trip to Peru -- Part 1

In May 2010, we traveled to Peru for a two week trip. The core of the trip was a hike in the Andes. But the first couple of days we started off in Lima.

The history of Peru is fascinating -- it is one of those locations where the history is very much alive today. In early 1500s Peru was ruled by the Inca, the Emperor of a huge 10+ million strong empire that stretched from current Ecuador in the north to the northern reaches of current Chile in the south and from the Pacific Ocean over the Andes and down into the Amazon jungle on the eastern slopes. The Incan empire was divided into 4 provinces and the capital was the town of Cusco, up at 11,800 feet in the Andes.

[Neat fact: One of the 4 provinces, the one on the far side of the mountains, was known as the Antisuyu. It is thought that the current name for the mountains "Andes" is derived from the "Antis" -- that is those who lived in Antisuyu on the other side of the range].

In 1532 Francisco Pizarro, a Spanish conquistador, arrived in Peru with 168 men. With the superiority of his arms (rifles, swords, armor and horses for the Spanish vs. cloth and clubs for the Incans) he won a decisive battle at Cajamarca, capturing the Incan emperor Atahualpa. Within a year he had captured Cuzco and installed a puppet Incan ruler Manco (Manco later led a rebellion) and shortly thereafter he founded Lima.

Thus, Lima's central plaza, known as the Plaza d'Armas, is a monument to Catholic domination of region. There are two large churches that dominate the plaza. The magnificence of the structures is, however, perhaps best captured by the intricacy of the filigree work on the woodworking of the buildings. It's almost overwhelming the level of detail -- the picture doesn't do it justice.

One of the highlights of the visit to Lima (and indeed, of the entire visit to Peru) was the quality of the food we eat. In Lima we stayed in a community to the north of the central part of town known as Miraflores. Miraflores is an upscale community filled with coffee shops and a small walking parks. On the edge of the district is a pre-Incan ruin known as Huaca Pucllana, sort of mini-pyramid like structure. We were fortunate enough to dine at a restaurant literally in the shadows of the ruins, called, fittingly enough Restaurant Huaca Pucllana. There we dined on a Peruvian fusion menu that included the native specialty of guinea pig, and included the domestic specialty drink, a pisco sour (absolutely a killer -- don't have more than one).

We also had the chance to visit the Parque del Amore, on the Pacific coast in Miraflores. As you can see, the park is dedicated to the conception of love. This giant statute (see the person at the bottom right for scale) is said to have scandalized the local population when it was first constructed, but by contemporary standards it seems a bit tame. The remainder of the park is a Gaudi-esque construction of tiles with odes to love. Apparently the custom is for local couples who get married to have their names created in tiling and put up on the park benches. It was pretty cute.

On the whole though, we probably spent more time in Lima than we needed too. It is, by and large, simply a big city with the traffic and congestion that attend that status. After two days, we were not unhappy to be heading to our next stop ... Cuzco.