The Best of Both Worlds

My bus for Nazca left Lima at around 9, and before we even left the city the sand dunes started to come up on the horizon.  The whole coast of Peru is complete desert, and it is a massive one at that.  The image I always had of South America was of lush greenery, but due to some strange coastal currents that bring extremely cold water, and the Andes mountains to the east, which strip all the incoming clouds of whatever rain and moisture they might carry, the coast gets almost no rain.  For some stretches you could see nothing but sand, stretching out on both sides of the bus to the horizon, with the black topped freeway running straight down the middle providing stark contrast to the tan color of all the sand.  About two hours out of the city our van broke down.  We were luckily enough to be near a bluff of sand that overlooked the ocean from a height of about 500 feet, so while the driver was trying to get everything repaired I sat on top of the sand dune with the cool breeze passing by.  It was actually quite a pleasant place to have car trouble! 

But before all that, I spent my last day in Lima on Sunday touring the national museum, and then checking out one of the archeological sites in the city.  The site is called Huaca Pucllana, which is a Quechua word meaning “lugar de juego”, or in English “playground.” (more or less).  It is a big mound of adobe bricks piled up into walls, and then terraced to make a pyramid type structure.  The place sits right in the middle of a residential zone in the posh section of town called Miraflores.  Apparently for a long time this was private property, and nobody was allowed to excavate or study what was there. The locals used it, ironically, as a place to hang out with your friends and play sports.  Finally the rich family who owned the land were forced to give up the place to the government.  My guide, who is the coolest person I have met in my two days in Peru, told me all this gleefully. 

Part of what you can see now is original, and part are walls that the archeologists have reconstructed.  You would not be able to tell the difference if you didn’t know what to look for.  But this site was part of the Lima culture, which was then taken over the the Huari around the tenth century.  The history of Lima goes way back before the Spanish ever founded the city.   It was a fantastic way to spend the afternoon, all made possible by the enthusiastic guide I had to show me around.  Afterwards I wandered down to the cliffs by the sea, and took in the views.  How awesome is it to have that kind of view right downtown.  I think that all the negative opinions Lima receives ought to be reevaluated. 

Well tomorrow morning is my flight over the Nazca lines.  I am pretty excited about it.  That will be the focus, I think, of my posting tomorrow.