Arequipa

(Peru, Jan 2009 continued)

After four days in Lima we flew to Arequipa, Peru’s second largest city, population one million or so. Overland, via bus through Ica and Nazca on “the Gringo Trail,” it’s 16 to 18 hours, so the one-hour, 450 mile (700+ km), $125 round trip (Lima to Arequipa and back to Lima from Cuzco) was not a difficulty decision.





(click on photos to expand)

Arequipa, to our taste, was vastly more pleasant than Lima. In spite of it’s size and population, the old colonial city center is compact and clean. Lima was neither, and muggy to boot, 75-80 F(23-25 C) with high humidity and haze. Arequipa is at an altitude of 7,700 feet (2350 m) and is very dry. While January is in the rainy season, the monthly average is only one inch (actually 28 mm) and while it was often cloudy we had dry weather with highs in the low 70s (low 20s C).

The heart of colonial Arequipa is the Plaza de Armas, surrounded by the cathedral and municipal buildings.

Our hostel, the Casa de Melgar, (found courtesy of Lonely Planet Peru) was in a great old colonial house, previously the home of the Bishop, with a succession of patios stretching back 50 meters or so from the entrance.

This patio was almost directly below our room.

Breakfast in the glassed in dining room included muesli of quinoa* and puffed corn, scrambled eggs with ham, bread, jams, coffee or tea, and coca leaf tea (!?). *Quinoa is a native Peruvian small grain, tasty and high in protein. It can be popped, as in muesli, or cooked like rice. Whole Foods has it; it’s very good.

Coca leaf tea, or mate de coca is served everywhere in the Peruvian highlands. Taken either as tea or chewed, it is effective against altitude sickness. A gets migraines, and was concerned that the high altitudes we were going to experience, up to around 14,750 feet (4,500 m), would give her soroche, altitude sickness. She had been taking a pharmaceutical, but started having side effects, so she stopped it and we relied on mate de coca with breakfast and chewed coca during the day if we felt any symptoms. Neither produced any noticeable high, but coca evidently works: neither of us was sick, though we certainly noticed the altitude climbing the steep streets in Cusco.

The major tourist site in Arequipa is the Santa Catalina Monastery, a city-block sized complex of buildings begun in 1580 and only opened to the public in 1970. The nuns, who had to be “Spanish” (not mestizo) came from wealthy families who could pay the substantial dowry required for entry.

The convent is a maize of buildings, courtyards, gardens and narrow alleys....

When I noticed that the kitchens had indigenous flat grinding stones rather than European style querns I first began to suspect that the nuns were not doing the chores.

The laundry.

The nuns brought their household furnishings and personal women servants, who evidently were thus interred for life, and lived a life of luxury; though museum displays of barbed wire underwear and other items for bodily mortification suggest that all not was not fun and games.

In the 1870s the monastery was reformed, servants and slaves were eliminated or reduced in number, and its wealth was transferred to the Vatican. Twenty to 40 nuns (depending on what you read) still occupy the monastery.

Neither Alejandra, who is a practicing Catholic, nor I was uplifted by this 450 year history of exploitation, luxury, slavery and piety, though the monastery itself is beautiful.

But on a more positive note, the adjoining Trattoria de Monasterio has great food! We started with pisco sours and a very interesting complementary tidbit of three inch flour tortillas with a picadillo of minced vegetables to put on top. Then we shared this ceviche de verduras, (right) followed by osso buco with a ricotto relleno.

(to be continued; Peruvian food is next....)

Peru - January 2009 - Lima

Lima

I suspect you may recognize this photo… it’s the obligatory shot from the hut of the guardian at Machu Picchu, taken the next to last day of our trip.


We started out in Lima on January 8, after flying in from Santiago, 1500 miles to the south west. With population of 8.5 million spread over 300 square miles Lima has a bit of everything, but like most tourists we spent our time in two areas; the historic center and the up-scale neighborhoods of San Isidro and Miraflores near the coast south of downtown.



Driving across Lima from the airport it was clear that we were in the third world. While Santiago feels much like the US or Europe, Lima reminds me of Mexico City in the 70s: mostly gritty, crowded, and dirty. While not poor by international standards (Peru’s per capital GDP is near the world’s median at $8,500), it was pretty obvious that folks were just getting by. Alejandra was struck that many buildings were half finished; inhabited but unpainted and with reinforcing bars sticking out of the roofs; evidently waiting for money to build the next floor. The photo, taken from the national museum shows a fairly typical urban scene of working class neighborhoods.

The center of historic Lima is the Plaza de Armas with the Cathedral on one side (right) and the national palace (left) on the other.

The plaza was full of Peruvian and international sightseers, plus dozens of assorted touts, beggars and vendors, especially at noon when the ornately uniformed guard changes, though since everything occurred behind bars and a line of riot police it was a little difficult to appreciate.

Lonely Planet Peru made us conscious of the bag snatchers and pick pockets, as well as the general crime rate so we were a bit leery of large crowds, but we had no problems; other than escaping from aggressive vendors. We eventually learned that the only way to avoid a five minute hard sell is to completely ignore them. The slightest show of interest or curiosity and they will stay with you indefinitely.

On the third side is the Palacio de la Municipalidad with the Union Club on the first floor, sight of a great mid-day buffet of classic Peruvian dishes.

East of the Plaza de Armas is the central market and Barrio Chino. Peru’s Chinese population is very visible, Chinese restaurants or chifas are very popular and Chinese influenced Peruvian food like lomo slatado (beef-tomato stir fry) and chufa (fried rice) are served everywhere. The largest supermarket chain is Wongs.

Our B&B ( left) was several miles from the city center in the San Isidro neighborhood; the up-scale home of golf clubs (below right) restaurants, hotels and the city’s wealthy, as well as the Japanese embassy, site of the 1996 hostage crisis.

It also has very classy supermarkets. Like the shirt?

Lima’s classiest mall, the ocean-side Larcomar is in nearby Miraflores. We had a very good meal there, though the $7 glass of white wine was a surprise. I eventually learned to stick to pisco sours and beer while in Peru.

Otherwise, restaurants were very reasonable, with two or three course meals with drinks running from $15 to $45.

Here, at the Punta Sal restaurant in San Isidro, we started with pisco sours; followed by a shared ceviche of corvina, the classic Peruvian dish. Alejandra’s main course was a shrimp pasta; mine was a pasta with a creamy sauce of Peruvian yellow chiles topped by fried squid.

Ceviche

Punta Sal’s wine was more reasonable.

The ocean front in the Miraflores area is a broad park reaching to the edge of the cliffs, though the beach itself is not particularly attractive.

…continued  here.