Day 7: Lima

Finally, we had to say goodbye to the beautiful historical city of Cusco and head back to Lima, where we would fly back. We decided early on that we would want to stay at least half a day in the capital city just to check this place out. 

We almost didn't make it. LOL! We headed to the airport at 6:30AM for our flight to Lima with Avianca Airlines at 8:40AM. We picked Avianca because it had the cheapest flights to Lima, just a little over $100, and it was just 1 hour flight. There's usually hourly flights to Lima, and apparently they had cancelled the 7AM flight without notice. So at 6:30AM we were waiting in line to check-in at the counter but we were still in this same line at 8:20AM. The check-in counter lady asked us if we could carry on our luggage instead of checkin them in, and we said yes to my bag, but not to C's because we had scissors in there. 

Wrong decision. 

When we got on the plane at 8:30AM, we didn't leave till close to 9. Once we arrived in Lima, we discovered that the plane came empty - without any of the check-in luggage! Thankfully we were still going to be in Lima for the evening, so we signed some paperwork for the luggage to be delivered to our hotel. Prayed really hard that it would arrive on time! 

We went on our one and only group tour in Peru. They picked us up at our hotel in Miraflores around 3 in a van and then we were all transferred to a big bus. We honestly did not like this tour. It was a bilingual tour - so the tour guide was speaking both in English and Spanish. Her English was very heavily accented, so we didn't know if she was speaking English or Spanish most of the time. 

We drove around the various neighborhoods and finally we made it to the main Plaza. 

I realized very quickly how much Lima resembled Manila where I grew up! Crazy, busy rounds, tons more pollution, a huge disparity between rich and poor, and some of the architecture was similar, too! 

While Spanish colonial architecture is really nice, I really wish that they at least preserved some of the pre-colonial architecture just to preserve some history. This is how I felt as well when we visited a lot of these buildings in other colonial countries, including where I'm from, Philippines. 

Then, we went to visit this church and the catacombs, as it was the practice before of the commonfolk to desire to be buried in church to be closer to God. 

Couldn't help but notice the little quail egg cart, just because I LOVE quail eggs so much and they were just all over Peru! 

And soonafter this, we got dropped off at the Larcomar Mall which is a really nice seaside mall in Peru, with all the imported stores, of course. Had a simple dinner and headed back to our hotel. Thankfully, at 10:30PM our luggage arrived. In a few hours, we headed to the airport and flew back to Vancouver. This trip was definitely decorated with early wake-up call's (which were the true cause of any jet lag we felt!) but definitely worth it for the amazing country we were able to visit! 

Love, 

C&K