Peru: buses, desert & sand equals fun for one & all........

As the title alludes to I am in Peru at the moment. We took a 4 hour bus followed by an 8 hour bus to cross the border between Ecuador and Peru. We spent our time in Cuenca as our last city in Ecuador and it was really nice, spanish colonial buildings and Panama Hats.

I now have a new appreciation for buses and the distances travelled in Australia on them. As I go further into our Peruvian Adventures thus far you will see that buses are a feature.

Piuru was our first city in Peru. Literally built on the sand. We spent our day shopping and chillaxing around the main drag and in our hostel aptly named Hostal California. We found in the local mall a clothing brand called Doo Australia. We now have a team travel top with that spread across the front with a VW Van & a kangaroo in the background, who says that I have no national pride? Anyways we headed from Piuru to Lima on a 15 hour overnight bus. However, these buses are more like planes, in that there are classes (first and second), reclining chairs and meals served (although they are the same sub par standard plane food usually is).

Lima is a big, dirty city, but we didn´t hate it. We stayed in the suburb called Miraflores, which was nice first in a cheap hostel and then in a nicer one for a reason I will reveal shortly. For our first afternoon we wandered the streets to the sea front where there is a massive shopping centre built into the cliff, it was nice but more like the Manuka of Lima so our money stayed put. That evening we decided that the local shopping centre had some nice deli food for a cheap meal we could eat at the hostel whilst we were watching a movie.

My mistake was choosing chicken fried rice. I was up at 2am with the results of food poisoning that lasted till about 8am. This is the reason we had to relocate as the hostel we were currently at had only one bathroom. I spent the rest of that day in bed feeling horrible and sleeping. Bron & Jane were excellent nurses. It took me the next 3 or so days to start to feel ok again. We went into Central Lima the next morning when I was feeling a bit better to see the changing of the gaurd at the government building. As we were heading in we were confronted by a large demonstration that we had to navigate to continue to our destination. As a result we think when we reached the central square there were riot police everywhere and even a water cannon. We asked the Police if it was safe and they laughed a yes at us, but as there were other ¨white-ies¨(as Bron has coined) around we stayed and it was fine, the demonstration never made it to us, whatever that means...

We left Lima on a 5 hour bus heading to Ica, yet another city in the desert built ontop of the sand. We actually stayed in an oasis called Huacachina which was literally a small backpacker town built near a lake in the middle of the desert. We went out on the dunes in a buggee, taking the dunes like a rollercoaster and went sand boarding tomboggan style, it was awesome fun. Watched the sun set over the dunes, then had happy hour and dinner back at our hostel.

I am currently in Nazca. Bron & I flew over the Nazca Lines this afternoon, it was pretty cool. This one was one of my favourites.

Right now I am waiting for yet another bus, an overnight one that will take 10ish hours or so Arequipa, which is a city futher south & our last stop before Cuzco and Maccu Picchu. Again I point out my new appreciation for buses and long haul road transport.