Lima, Peru, South America

Today was pretty productive, though I didn’t really get to do much in Lima. I finally got to take care of my insurance forms that I needed to fill out, print, sign, and scan. This is all for the stuff that was stolen from me when I was in Banos, Ecuador. Being on the road and staying in hostels, it’s not very easy to find a place that has a printer and scanner, so I ended up going to a Sheraton Hotel that had a business center I could use to take care of my stuff. It worked out well, and they didn’t even charge me, so that was a bonus.

It took most of the day for me to take care of the insurance stuff. I was on the phone with the company a couple of times and then had to go take care of the paperwork, including searching for email receipts for all the things that were stolen. What a pain in the neck. And by the time I was finished with all that, it was too late for me to go do any sightseeing.

I did get to go out tonight though, and I had a great time. I got a text from another one of Melissa’s friends, and this one lives here in Lima. Juan Felipe met me at 8pm and took me down to the Parque de la Reserva, which is the most famous park in Lima. It has twelve pretty impressive water fountains, and we got to see them at night, which is the best time to visit.

Juan Felipe’s girlfriend, Madeleine, met us in the park and after we saw the laser show at the main fountain, we went out for dinner. He drove us to the shore and we went to a restaurant called Tanta at a really fancy shopping mall in Miraflores. I tried a couple of new peruvian things that I hadn’t had before. I tried a Pisco sour drink, cuasa limena for a starter, and lomo saltado for my main meal. Everything we ate was excellent, and it was nice to have some really friendly company as well. Juan Felipe is another world traveller from Colombia, and it was really nice to chat for a while.

We finished up with dinner at about midnight and they drove me back to the hotel. I’m getting up at 5:30am tomorrow to get my bus down to Nasca. I’m looking forward to getting out of the big city and head down there to do some proper sightseeing.