After an overnight bus from Ecuador, we arrived in Peru about a week and a half ago. Following a short stop in the coastal town of Piura, we headed up the Peruvian coast to the little beach town of Máncora. The contrast between highland Ecuador and coastal Peru was pretty dramatic. We went to sleep to cloudy mountain roads and woke up in the middle of a desert, which stretches along much of Peru's coast. We also got our first taste of truly hot weather and were relieved when we finally got to Máncora and could get our backpacks off and shorts on.
We stayed in Máncora for four nights and spent our days sitting on the beach (not much else to do there). Managed to get a few good burns and plow through a few more books. Allison took a surfing lesson, despite the fact that she's not very naturally suited to it (doesn't really like to swim and isn't a big fan of being turned upside down in the surf) - the hour lesson was largely spent falling off the back of the board and then getting dragged around in the shallow water. Jeff did a little surfing that day, too, and found that after a break from surfing of at least two years, it seemed like the first time again (although he can actually stand on the board).
Other memories from Máncora: introduction to the moto-taxi (a motorcycle with a covered, two-seat rickshaw behind it - sort of looks like a Model T from the back); four days of fresh fish and seafood; and the town running out of water and the electricity shutting down on our last day there (not to be an isolated Peruvian incident, we learn).
From Máncora we traveled south to the larger coastal city of Chiclayo to see a few important sights around the city before heading further south. One of the more famous archeological sights in the country, located outside of Chiclayo, are the tombs of Sipan. About 15 years ago, several graves of pretty high-class royalty of the Moche civilization (ca. 100-900 AD) were found, along with an incredible amount of gold, not to mention lots of wives, children, animals, servants, etc., that were put down with them to ensure a successful afterlife. We visited the excavation site and then, later, an off-site museum. The museum is pretty impressive (supposedly on some list like "The 10 Best Museums in the World that You Have Never Heard Of"). They built the museum in the shape of the pyramid that the tombs were found in and you move down through the building to see the booty from the tombs in the order in which the archeologists found it. If you are interested, take a look at this website (sorry, it's in Spanish, but it has pretty good photos).
We didn't do a whole lot else in Chiclayo, other than walk around. Although there is not a lot else to do, it's an interesting place to visit. It seemed like the streets were always packed and we got a feel for everyday life in coastal Peru. We also took a long walk through their huge outdoor market (looking for the famous witchcraft section, which we never found), where somebody tried to sell Jeff an octopus for the equivalent of 30 cents.
From Chiclayo we headed to Trujillo (interestingly, the movie shown to pass the bus ride was "Thirteen" - for those who have seen it, you'd likely agree that it's an interesting choice for a age-diverse audience, not to mention a pretty distorted depiction of American girls!) Trujillo is the third largest city in Peru and we really enjoyed our time there. The central city is pretty, with pastel colonial buildings, gas light-esque street lights, a big central park/plaza, and a large section of town that is shut off to vehicles for much of the day, creating a busy walking mall. There always seemed to be people out and about and the residents of Trujillo have a pretty good sense of fun. As we write this, it sounds like a brass band is marching down the street at 7 o'clock at night, which, due to the heat of the day, is about when most people are out anyway. We spent some time in the central plaza around dusk the first few days we were there and both times ended up having people come up to chat with us for at least a half hour (once entirely in Spanish, once entirely in English - we are finding Peruvians to be exceptionally friendly and extroverted). Jeff also spent a fair amount of time for awhile one night bonding with the children trying to sell us candy. For background, you see child street vendors all over Latin America, but it seems like the Peruvian children have chosen an elevated use of the pouty "Look how sad I am..." look and are pretty persistent. We were talking one day over lunch that if they were less pouty, we would be more likely to help them out - the "who can be the most pitiful" strategy gets a little wearing (not to diminish the fact that it is sad that their families have them roam around selling suckers and gum much of the night after going to school in the day). So, as we were sitting in the park and had two different kids trying to sell us gum, Jeff started asking them questions, and they instantly fell in love with their new friend. He asked them about where they lived, if they went to school, how much they earned each night selling candy, etc. He also told him our theory that if they were more cheerful and cute (as they were being as we talked to them), they may have more success with the backpacker crowd (who knows, maybe the pitiful look gets them further with Peruvians). Jeff tried to teach them "Hello, how are you?" in English, though they kept forgetting the "are." They hung out with us for about an hour until we left them to find some dinner (and, in the end, we bought candy from them after all...)
Trujillo is also known for its nearby ruins and we visited two more sites. One was another Moche site - a recently excavated pyramid used for human sacrifices. We also went to the ruins of a huge adobe city called Chan Chan (whole thing is over 20 square kilometers), used by the Chimu people (post-Moche, pre-Inca). As you drive along the highway to the ocean, you see the ruined walls on both sides of the road for quite a long time. They were both pretty interesting, and we have posted a few photos of each site.
After spending a few days in the city, we moved to the nearby beach town of Huanchaco. This was largely a repeat of our time in Máncora, minus the surfing. Like Máncora, the beach was packed with Peruvians enjoying the summer coastal months, intermixed with a handful of foreign travelers (mainly from Europe).
We keep coming back to Latin America, because it seems like there is always something surprising, fun, funny, and/or interesting going on... Since Latin America continues to surprise us, here are a few memorable moments from the last week: bus station/family room combination in Máncora (imagine crying baby, angst-ridden teenager, uncle-figure laughing at Allison's burned ankles, and grandma sitting in a chair in the middle of all, looking like she had seen it all before, while mom tries to make a bus reservation for us (while yelling at her kids)); the persistent usage of crackly and often unintelligible loudspeakers by men with fruit carts to announce their goods (seems to be most often used with peaches); bakeries on wheels (sited many times in Máncora and Huanchaco - jimmied up bicycles with large wooden boxes of bread on them, presence announced by constant squeaking of black-bulbed bicycle horn); and sudden siting of naked woman running down street near Chiclayo market - didn't seem like anybody but us was surprised.
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