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12/26/2006 GINI Wine Taste VII: Nov 25 LCBO ReleaseMSN Sync from http://www.lightrelay.com/?p=57
12/5/2006 Peru - LimaPeru - Lima
When: Day 1, 13, and 16
Location: Miraflores, Lima Hotels: Faraona Grand Hotel http://www.faraonagrandhotel.com JW Marriott Hotel Lima http://marriott.com/property/propertypage/LIMDT Technically, we were in Lima for less than two days. We were there for 6 hours for Day 1 and half of Day 13. Day 16 was last day of our trip, and we did a quick city tour in the afternoon. So in the end, we still don't know much about Lima. In fact, most of the time we were in one district of Lima, Miraflores, where most tourists hang around.
6 Hours of Lima
Of the 6 hours, we spent an hour getting out of the airport, one and a half hour going back and forth between the airport and our hotel, and half hour to check into our room. By then, we had about two hours before meeting up with our tour group. I knew right the way two hours of sleep won't be much help, so I took my time, taking shower, repacking some of the clothing (putting warm clothing away for the rainforest days), and watching TV.
Hotel is called the Faraona Grand Hotel. Chosen by our tour company, it is where we join (Day 1) and depart (Day 13) the tour group. This hotel reminds me of the hotel I stayed in Honolulu last year; some of the decor and facilities seem a little dated, but it's been well-maintained and clean. Of course I didn't see it as clean when we first got there, but second time around, after going through rainforest and camping, it looked especially clean and comfortable.
Last day of our trip
The other hotel we stayed in Lima was the JW Marriott. It's a 4-stars hotel, and they charge everything accordingly. A few things led us to this hotel: 1) the building itself looks interesting and beautiful, 2) I could get a corporate rate there, which is about 40% savings, 3) all rooms have ocean view. We were a little skeptical with that last claim. Turns out, most of the rooms do have nice big view of the ocean, but some of them have a small view of it. We got two rooms, one with a nice view, the other one with a tiny bit space where you can see the ocean.
But ocean view is a little overrated, especially when we were not there around sunset. Basically it is facing west, so not much to see in the morning. But sunset over the Pacific is quite lovely.
The area just in front of the hotel has a nice outdoor shopping mall called LarcoMar <http://www.larcomar.com/larcomar_index.htm>. It's probably one of the few places in Peru where it feels like North America. It's where we had KFC, real tasty chicken. It's also where I had Starbucks (coffee tastes just like home, too bad they don't have oatmeal raisin cookies) I'm sure we could've spent the whole day there, but we all know it's better to do a city tour, no matter how quick and brief it is. So in the same fashion, I list the places we went, just as briefly:
All these places in 3 hours. Our tour leader Maria did a fine job, probably speak the best English speaking guide we met. At our request, they drove us to an area in Miraflores filled with Handicraft markets. Although I'm not big in shopping, they sell plenty of interesting things, and it's not hard to spend a couple hours there. Finally, before heading to the airport, we went to some fancy restaurant, Restaurant Huaca Pucllana <http://www.resthuacapucllana.com> I had Creole Style Chupe <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chupe>, a typical Peruvian crayfish chowder. I thought the place is not bad, and the best thing about this restaurant is the view of the adobe pyramid, right outside of the building. But rest of us thought service could be better, i.e. a waiter who can speak English. It was our last day of the trip, I guess by then we all just wanted go home. 12/1/2006 Peru - Puno / Lake TiticacaWhen: Day 11 and 12
Location: Puno and Lake Titicaca Hotel: Casona Plaza Hotel http://www.casonaplazahotel.com/ After a full day of travelling in a van, we finally got to our hotel in Puno. Casona Plaza hotel is one of the better hotels we stayed in Peru. They have very nice bathroom, I know because I spent plenty of time there. That day, Nov 5, happened to be Puno Day, a local holiday. There was a parade in the streets, and our hotel was right in the middle of it. Too bad that it was all noise to me while I was resting in our hotel room. All other people went out to watch the parade and had dinner.
Apparently not all rooms have functional cable TV, but ours was working fine. I was basically watching English TV in my bed the whole evening; Law and Order, CSI, Gilmore Girls, House. But I was so sick I was considering staying in hotel room for the rest of the trip. Thanks to Vince, I got plenty of water and a little bit to eat, although I wasn't really able to eat. Fortunately, I felt good enough to get out of the room the next morning; I was a little worried with the idea of sitting in a boat for a few hours.
Floating Reed Islands of UrosFirst place we visited in Lake Titicaca was the floating islands. While it is true that the Uros still live on these floating islands, the ones we visited felt more like floating souvenir stands. I guess those are set up specifically for tourists, a good demostration on how these islands float. There was a stand with a post box, for people to get postcards and to sent them. I think Tyatt got one to sent to her folks, but I'm not sure if they ever got it.
Taquile IslandAfter the visit to the floating island, we headed to the Taquile Island. It's about two hours of boat ride, kinda gives you an idea how big Lake Titicaca is. The island is famous for high quality handicrafts. It's interesting that it's the men there do the knitting, not the women (or weren't allowed?) Everyone except me bought quite a bit of stuff there. But I like the landscape there the most, it is just different from all other places we visited in Peru. I felt I was inside of a nice piece of painting. Although there wasn't really much to do there, I think it's worth the time to make this trip.
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