Wednesday, July 11, 2007

We're in Lima!

Yes, indeed, we are here. It was a very uneventful flight, but we all agreed that we rather like TACA as an airline. The service was good, the snacks and drinks were frequent, and the flights were on time.

We met up with my parents in SFO and then in San Salvador, from where we took the same flight to Lima. Nico and I agreed that it was rather frustrating being in El Salvador , seeing it out the windows, and not being able to go and poke about. Nico and Susana in San Salvador airportAs it was, we were there less than an hour before reboarding the plane and thus only had enough time to grab a coffee.

San Salvador airport

My brother Toño was there to meet us at the Lima airport, and we caught a cab to San Felipe. I was rather surprised that it was basically raining in Lima, as you can appreciate from this photo taken along Av. Pershing, which runs along the western edge of the our neighborhood. It's not supposed to do that here.

Rain along Avenida Pershing
My aunts and uncles came over to the apartment later. (The apartment is on the next to last floor -the fourteenth- in the building you see in the title banner for this blog.)

We went out to dinner a 'El Corralito', which is a rotisserie chicken (pollo a la brasa) joint, which makes some of the best chicken, nicely spiced in the Peruvian style, accompanied by really tasty fries - in Peru potatoes do have a lot of flavour.

Later we retired to my cousins' apartment in the next building over. My uncle Willy, and my cousins Diego, José, Mito, and Juancho were there and after a while of chatting over some nice Argentine wines, the kids and Juancho got hungry, so some more pollo a la brasa was ordered. Naturally, this too was cleaned to the bone. Even Diego's puffball of a dog, Kafu, helped in this task.

It´s now a bit past one in the morning and I´m the last one up. It's pretty quiet, but we've already had one earthquake at about 12:30 am. No one even got out of bed.

The view from my bedroom

I took a bunch of video on the way from the airport, but it either didn't turn out or the software on Toño's computer isn't the right one to read it. It's late, so I'll worry about it tomorrow.

Good night.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Just a few hours to go. As I write we're about to load up the van with the luggage and head for SFO. When next I post, it shall be from Peru!

Saturday, July 7, 2007

New Wonder


Click on the image for a 3-D tour of Machu Picchu (in Spanish)


Machu Picchu has been selected as one of the modern 7 Wonders of the World in a contest in which over 100 million people voted for their choice among the candidates. The announcement was made today in Lisbon, Portugal, by the non-profit New7Wonders organization, which sponsored and organized the worldwide vote. The other sites elected as new wonders of the world were the Great Wall of China, Petra, Chichén Itzá, the Colloseum in Rome, Rio's gigantic 'Christ the Redeemer' statue, and the Taj Mahal.

It seems that this is an auspicious year to visit Machu Picchu! (I hope it won't be more crowded...)

Change of plans...

Liz is still going (yay!) but not quite in time for the Ayacucho portion of the trip, as that just wasn't really going to work out ideally. So, now it's early August, in time for Juancho's (my cousin, not me) birthday celebration.

As for the rest of us, we're down to three and one-half days before we depart, and looking at the errands and other things we must get done in that time. Well, me at least. With Liz's help, the kids are pretty much set with what they need.

Wish I could say the same for myself. Better get myself in gear ... .

Friday, July 6, 2007

Fantastic News!

Liz's boss approved her trading shifts in order for her to attend the reunion, so, she's going to Peru!!! And, in time for the trip to Ayacucho, too!

Sunday, July 1, 2007

Regarding July 19th

It turns out that July 19th, besides being my birthday, will be marked by two other events of interest.

Firstly, the date will mark the beginning of Lima's XII International Book Fair, to be held until the 29th in the Jockey Plaza Convention Center.




Secondly, -and this is understandably good news- the "Pisco Party", or Fiesta del Pisco, which was to have been held in June at the Museo de la Nacion, has been postponed 'til -you guessed it- July 19th. It is now scheduled to run until the 22nd of July.

Just for the fun of it, and in honor of the occasion, here's a video on pisco, its history, and uses: