The Unnecessity of an Alarm Clock

Well, I´ve been in Lima, Peru since late Thursday night. Frankly, I haven´t done a whole lot and it has been wonderful. I have never been on a vacation without feeling like I have to jam everything into a short amount of time. Hence, I´ve slept in every day since I´ve been here, forgot an alarm clock and brought white flip flops. Why did I do that?! They´re already gross. Silly me.

Two days ago, we walked around the district pictured below, Miraflores, all afternoon. It is just north of the Barranco district, where I´m staying. Also, do not be deceived by the blue water, it´s not that blue and had been deemed not clean enough to swim in, although many locals do, as well as surf. Lima is also pretty stinky. It´s been fun so far, but nothing I would highly, highly recommend. Once will be enough. I´m looking forward to moving outside of the big city.

Looking at Miraflores, arguably the fanciest district in Lima. There were a lot of tourists here.

I have met some fun people, with great stories and adventures that makes me feel lame. For example, there is a Canadian kid at my hostel who drove a motorcycle from Alberta, through Washington, Oregon, California, Mexico and then when he reached Guatemala, his bike (and him!) caught on fire and was toast. Literally. So after a few weeks of headaches trying to buy a new one in Mexico, he flew back home to Alberta, bought another bike and started over!! He said originally he had enough money to travel on his bike for 3 years but now with having to start his trip over, probably only 18 months or so. His final destination is to volunteer at a water purification project in Chile (I believe) to put his degree in engineering to use for a few months. How cool!

Then there was a Swiss couple. Cute looking pair, who started backpacking through Asia, flew to South America and will have traveled for 6 months total. Talk about a backpacking trip! Geesh. Oh, and when asked what they are going to do when they get home, they modestly said, we both have jobs waiting for us. Pretty cool. Then, when probed for what they will be doing, they said, we both just finished up schooling to be doctors and have residencies in dermatology and as a surgeon!! Geeeeez, these people are so cool! They were so modest about it all.

Makes me feel sort of lame for having a bachelor´s degree and not knowing what to do when I get home! Oh, maybe next post, I´ll tell you about Steve from Austrailia. Talk about world touring! This post is getting a little long, so I will wrap it up!

Today, we took the bus into the center of town. We saw multiple churches as well as the very impressive Plaza Mayor, also known as Plaza de Armas. It has been declared an UNESCO World Heritage Site. It was huge! Below is a small part of it. I haven´t been able to upload any of my pictures yet, so hang tight. This will have to do.

I just googled to find this picture, but have nearly the same one on my camera!

Anywho, I´m stinky and need to go shower. Look for more updates before we head to Huaraz on Friday!