Tuesday was a fun day of making travel arrangements for my trip to the Sacred Valley/ Cusco/ Machu Picchu. The first night I get there I have reservations to stay at this colorful, bohemian hostal, called “Casa de la Gringa” quoted in the guide book as being the place for (get this): “those who come to Cusco on spiritual and mystical journeys”. It also has a large herb garden. Surprise, surprise. So basically it is a hippie hostal but I am kind of excited because it sounds really chill and I bet there’d be interesting people crashing there. After having a last hurrah in Cusco with Julia and her sister, a group of us: Melissa, Abby, Abby’s friend and I are going to spend the night at Agua Calientes and get up bright and early (4:30ish) to get to Machu Picchu before the crowds (6am). I figure it’s once in a lifetime so we better do it right. From Machu Picchu there are some other destinations such as Ollantaytambo and Pisac, where there are awesome ruins, hiking trails and a festival going on at Pisac around July 16th. After seeing all there is to see in Cusco and the Sacred Valley I’m flying to Argentina on the 21st of July where a bunch of us from the program are gonna crash at the apartment Kurt’s rented in Buenos Aires. From there I hope to spend a few days in Montevideo, Uruguay, which is 8 hours away on ferry/bus. I’ll fly out of Montevideo to Cochabamba, Bolivia on the 31st and spend a few days in Cochabamba on my own, exploring the town and surrounding jungle/ nature reserves. Then it’s between a 7 and 10 hour bus ride to La Paz, the capital of Bolivia, where I’ll meet up with Rubie! From La Paz we’re going to skirt around Lake Titicaca (which is supposed to be gorgeous), cross back over the Peruvian border, and bus along the southern coast of Peru hitting up the hot spots: Puno, Arequipa, Nazca, Chincha, then end up back in Lima before our flights out on the 19th of August. I’m extremely stoked.
Yesterday a group of us went down Universitaria past Plaza San Miguel to eat at Kio, which was recommended to us by multiple people as the best place for chicharrones in all of Lima. The restaurant itself wasn’t much to look at – a bunch of plastic tables and chairs. And the chicharrón was a sandwich with huge chunks of fatty pork fried in its own fat. It wasn’t bad but not my favorite dish of Peru, due to the ridiculous amount of grease and fat. Another classic desert in Lima that I was not down with was Masamora, a pudding flavored like everyone’s favorite purple corn beverage – chicha morada. Just a tip, say no thanks to chicha morada, it’s this strangely flavored sickeningly sweet purple drink. Also, just as a side note, they have squirrels and deer on the Catolica campus that are colored differently, but the squirrels are really shabby and gross looking with creepy dark paws. Ew.
Last night I threw caring about my response paper to the wind and met up with Matt and Kurt in Miraflores. We first went to Media Naranja, which in Spanish literally means “half an orange” but colloquially means “my better half” or “my soul mate”. It’s the Brazilian restaurant/bar in Parque Kennedy which is cutely decorated and were they sell every type of caipirinha you could ever want (the Brazilian version of the pisco sour or margarita). It’s limes, lots of sugar all crushed together and liquor. That’s it. I used discretion, of course…After that we went to a bar with a cool atmosphere and lots of rod-iron and colored glass décor called Zeta, just down the street. The drinks were a bit more expensive and the wait staff was really unfriendly (which Rubie also noticed when she was there on a totally separate night!) We got some yummy guacamole though, served with buttery garlic bread for dipping (the best of two worlds!). Afterward we took a gander down Calle Berlin and chatted in a much more “Peruvian” hang out spot, snacking on some cancha (dried salted corn kernels). I hated cancha when I first got to Peru because they dry out your mouth like crazy but it’s really grown on me. All in all, a great evening of hopping around different spots around Parque Kennedy and hangin out. It just reminds me of why I love living in Lima.
