Posts Tagged san isidrio

Day one starting not only with a bang (-ing of doors that is) but of loud drunk neighbors interrupting my precious 4 hours of sleep before I had to depart to Peru at 7am. We had a layover in Panama and even though you’d think it would be empty at 4:45am at the airport, the line was as long as a day at Disney’s Space Mountain. To say the least, it was going to be a long day of traveling.

Awesome sunrise as we left Orlando

We made it to Panama after 3 hours of some Tara Reid wannabe incessantly yacking her mouth about drunken escapades and what I interpreted to be a lost youth. I tried to distract myself from her with the movie playing, Marley & Me, but I didn’t feel like crying (geez that movie is so sad!) so I ended up sticking my fingers in my ears & pouting. My travel buddy was separated from me on the plane, but it turns out she had a similar story of 2 guys bragging about every country they’ve ever been to. By the time we entered the plane from Panama to Peru, we were already chanting “BEER! BEER!”

BEER!

God bless international flights and their free liquor! After a “Panama” cerveza and some quiet time, spirits rose and we soon started to worry about whether or not the agency we paid to schedule everything even existed—BUT luckily Johanna was there with a sign that said Watson on it. Whew, thank you Peru Chasquitar. After this quick sign of relief, we were off to tour the city of Lima, formally known as ciudad de los Reyes, or city of the kings.

We arrive at the Plaza

First stop the Plaza where the guide described different styles of the buildings. There was a lot of woodwork everywhere, especially on the windows. It turns out this was the Moorish men’s style. The style was celoso, or something to that effect, because the men wanted their wives to be able to see out while no one else was able to see in. Celoso of course in Spanish means jealous, so it makes sense. Lots of the décor around seemed very dark and depressing. This continued on in the churches with the paintings and architecture.

Woodwork on the Moorish style windows

Also in the Plaza were governmental buildings and most buildings facing the square were painted an orangish yellow. This too is a prominent theme throughout the country. They are painted this color for el sol or the sun which is a very important figure in their culture. In fact, their money is named the Nuevo sol or new sun. I’m guessing that real gold was the old sun? Gold was used in many decorations as well in tribute or mock of the sun. Before the Spanish built their cathedrals on top of the native temples, they were used to adulate or tribute the sun amongst other miracles of nature.

Neat Architecture

After the square, we walked past one of the oldest bars in the city, where Mareike and I were hoping to sit down to good food & beer, but it turned out we were just passing through on the way to the Church and Convent of San Francisco. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures here. This turned out to be very unfortunate because there were so many ornate and interesting sights. The woodwork alone was amazing. I cannot decide whether the 17^th century library was my favorite or the piecework dome wood ceiling (bats included) was. Wow now that I think about it, the circular tomb in the catacombs was pretty amazing.

Monestary of San Francisco

The church is also a Franciscan Monastery and there are currently 30 monks living on the grounds. Marieke and I were shocked to see that they had books from the 17^th & 18^th century just sitting in the library with the windows wide open. The amazing thing was the breeze was fierce and it looked like some of the pages were going to fly away. Beneath the church, in the catacombs were bones scattered from around 25,000 people from centuries ago. My travel companion was a little spooked and it was eerily silent… it was almost inconceivable all the people that were “with us” down there!

Once we left the church, we drove around to San Isidrio and viewed the 475 year old olive trees. Now I’ve been to Italy & Greece, but I’ve never seen olive trees that big! We didn’t get pictures of these either because we didn’t get out of the bus. Finally the last stop was “Lover’s Park”. The tour guide sarcastically asked if we knew why it was called this, and I not paying attention to the large statue of a man and women making out in the middle of the square said “no, why?”. It was a lovely day and it seemed that all the flowers in Lima, especially the Indian paintbrush. The park sat on the cliffs overlooking the ocean & famous islands not far off the coast.

Indian Paintbrush

Enjoying the view

Finally, it was time to be dropped off at the hotel “El Ducado”. We walked to the main plaza for dinner and got to sit outside on the edge of the cliff overlooking the sunset. It was gorgeous! We ate at this Americanized restaurant called Mangos, and for the occasion we ordered the finest (and only one they had) bottle of Peruvian wine. I went for a traditional dish of Lomo Saltado ‘a la Mango’. Marieke went for the nontraditional filet mignon.

Mangos Restaurante

Peruvian Wine

Everything was excellent, but by this time I was beyond wiped out (since I hadn’t slept in…oh let’s see… almost 24 hours) I passed out on the bed the instant I touched it. And so ended my first day in Peru.