Lima being the second city on my Poste Restante list, after a good night’s sleep my first priority was to go the post office to see if there was any mail.
There was loads! It was just like Christmas…! It seemed that everyone who I’d hoped might write to me had sent either a letter or a Christmas card. Back at Casa Rodriquez I indulged in reading everything, then got chatting to a recently arrived German called Maria who was a little weird. I headed off to get some lunch then sat in the Plaza San Martin (one of Lima’s main squares) to write a whole lot of postcards, in reply to all my wonderful correspondence.
At the end of the afternoon I went out with Maria for a Chinese meal (Chinese food seems as common in Ecuador and Peru as anywhere I’ve been – I’m not sure why I find this surprising…). After some letter-writing back at the hotel I had an early night, since I felt that I had a cold coming on. However, I then got woken up by some Germans who had just arrived, and noisily occupied beds in the dormitory, without any care for people who were already trying to sleep. I gave them an earful…
I woke up with a stuffy nose and sore throat. I had an idle morning, then went out to a phone office and tried to ring my sister in Bedfordshire, but she was out, so rang my sister in Bristol. It was just a quick call to report where I was, say Happy Christmas / New Year, and that I had received mail OK in Lima. I left the phone number of Casa Rodriguez in case anyone wanted to attempt to ring me there.
After lunch I headed back and was writing my diary when someone yelled my name and said there was a phone call. It was my sister again calling from Bristol, to see if the number worked. After a little while the same thing happened, and this time it was my sister in Houston – since it was an incoming call I felt able to chat rather longer than if I had made the call! In the evening I had a wander round the nearby street markets and went searching to see if there was any typical Andean folk music being performed anywhere, but it seemed that nobody knew where I might be able to hear that…
My flight to Cusco was early the following morning so I went to bed very early. However, the same loud Germans again woke me up. There was a loud alarm clock in the room which I had set to wake me up at 4 am. It duly did. But then, to get a measure of revenge, when I left the room 10 minutes later I “accidentally” left it set for 5 am, and I left the room light on….
A taxi took me to the airport and within a couple of hours I was on a plane heading to the ancient Inca capital of Cusco. Then suddenly I wasn’t – the pilot announced that we were returning to Lima because it was too cloudy to land at Cusco! After an hour waiting on the ground in Lima we had another go. Fortunately I had a window seat on the left near the front and I had an excellent view of Cusco as we descended. It was suddenly very obvious why Cusco airport can easily be closed by cloudy weather – it is surrounded by mountains and in order to land, the plane has to fly down the valley with mountains alarmingly close either side.
Heading in to the centre of the city, I noticed the altitude, and took it slowly – rushing around too much after flying up from sea level could have given me altitude sickness. After checking in to a backpackers hotel I wandered around the beautiful old centre of Cusco, and investigated the possibility of getting the train to Aguas Calientes (below Machu Picchu) the following day. It is a special train – or rather special carriages for tourists – no roof travel allowed this time. To my delight I was able to get a ticket and reserve a seat.
Later I went to the “Cross Keys Pub” near the central Plaza de Armas – and had a beer. I had been attracted to it because the symbol of the college where I graduated (Peterhouse) is the Cross Keys. I then went to see if there was any Andean folk music to be heard anywhere, but was again disappointed – I started wondering where it is possible to hear the typical Andean panpipes and charangos if not here in Cusco… I can’t leave this area without hearing any of the hauntingly evocative music that is part of what attracted me here in the first place!
como siempre excelente relato!!! me reí con tu venganza a los alemanes…Perú mi segundo lugar en el mundo!!! hice el mismo viaje hace 2 años (Cuzco/Machupichu)
I remember phoning you in Lima & being told you were “en la calle” which took me a bit to work out that you were “out”, but tried later & successfully spoke to you – a relief!
I’ll take it that receiving all the letters at once is sort of like when your phone doesn’t have service and suddenly it does and there’s an explosion of texts and emails coming in ??. Ok. Maybe not quite the same.
Love how you set the alarm for the loud Germans. Brilliant. It is amazing how loud and rude people can be in those small dorm rooms.
I think the explosion of texts and emails when your phone gets service again is a perfect analogy…!! (Interestingly the previous commenter on this post has no idea what that feels like… 😀 )