Hello Peru!!

            I’ve been in Peru for less than 24 hours, and it’s already been quite an adventure! To recap the last day or so: after a very rainy drive to Houston yesterday morning, I made it to the Houston airport in plenty of time. Getting through security was a breeze, and at about four yesterday afternoon I boarded the six hour flight to Lima. The plane had seven seats per row (2-3-2), and I was originally supposed to be in the middle section. However, when I found my seat, the man next to me asked if I would switch with his son so they could sit together. Trade my middle seat for his son’s window seat? Sounded good to me! Even better, shortly after takeoff, the man sitting next to me asked to be moved to another seat since his screen wasn’t working, so I ended up getting two seats to myself. A combination of reading, watching The Martian, and taking pictures out the plane window made the six hours pass pretty painlessly. When we landed, the real fun began!

            Last summer, when I landed in Cape Town at night, it looked like a blanket with thousands of sparkling diamonds spread across it. There were LOTS of city lights! Lima wasn’t like that at all. Maybe it was partly due to the fact that it was cloudy, but my view out the window was pitch black until we were REALLY close to the ground.

            Finding my way through the Lima airport and getting through customs was pretty easy, despite the fact that all the signs were in Spanish. I waited at baggage claim longer than I’d ever had to wait at one before- it seemed like my bag was one of the last ones they took off the plane! It was close to midnight by the time I finally had all my bags and headed out of the airport to meet the taxi service I’d set up through the hostel. I was told that the driver would be waiting in the front of the airport with my name written on a sign. There were plenty of people holding signs with names on them, but I walked around for about twenty minutes and couldn’t find mine. By that point I was pretty exhausted and just wanted to get to a bed, so I found one of the many taxi drivers and, after making sure it was an “official” taxi, I showed him the address to my hostel, and we were off. Despite his limited English and my limited Spanish, we were able to work out where I was going, how much it would cost, and have some conversation for the half-hour taxi ride from the airport to my hostel. During that ride, I saw first-hand what I’d already been told plenty of times- drivers in Peru are CRAZY! Even at midnight, there were plenty of cars on the road, especially near the airport. Apparently staying within the lanes on the street was mostly just a suggestion, since there were at least three cars driving side by side on what looked like a two lane street. It seemed like drivers in Peru liked to use their horns a lot more than US drivers- it was almost like the drivers were trying to create a song with their horns! Finally, after a long day of travel, I made it to my hostel, paid my taxi, checked in, was shown my bed, and passed out.

            I woke up this morning feeling somewhat refreshed, though also in great need of free breakfast, a shower, and water that didn’t have dangerous amounts of mercury in it. Within an hour of waking up, I’d gotten all three of those things! I sat in the breakfast room of the hostel with three girls from Ireland that were traveling together, drinking coffee and talking about our previous and onward travels. When I mentioned where I was from, one of them asked me the inevitable question: “Why don’t you sound like you’re from Texas?” Not even 24 hours in this country, and I’m already getting that question!

            After breakfast I walked down a few blocks to a little convenience store that the Irish girls had told me about and bought a chocolate bar and bottle of water. It was only a few blocks, but walking around I noticed that, like I’d felt walking around in Africa last year, I felt remarkably safe. Sure, I stayed alert, but, being a 23-year-old American girl traveling alone in this unfamiliar place, I almost expected to feel unsafe, but I didn’t.

            After some much-needed rehydrating and an equally-much-needed shower, I was told that I needed to check out of my room by eleven, but was welcome to hang out in the main rooms of the hostel for the rest of the day. I’m currently sitting on a couch in the front room here at Backpacker’s Family Club hostel writing this. The man working at the front desk here also helped me set up another taxi to pick me up this evening and take me back to the airport to catch my flight to Bolivia.

            I’ll probably go out later and get lunch, but overall I’ve decided to take it easy today since yesterday was really busy, and I’m sure the next few days will be too. I also know that this won’t be my only time in Lima, so I don’t feel the need to see everything today.

            This has been one of the longest blog posts that I’ve written lately, so I’m going to end it here. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to update again as soon as I get to Bolivia, or if it will be a few days, so we’ll just have to wait and see. This post’s food for thought is one of my favorites, and really appropriate right now: “To awaken quite alone in a strange town is one of the pleasantest sensations in the world.”- Freya Stark.