It's Thursday....it must be Lima

Hello friends,

Wow, this trip is really moving along. Here I am in Lima, and the last place I wrote to you was Leymebamba. We took the combi to Chachapoyas that day, and then the night bus to Trujillo. A taxi brought us to the hotel that I'd reserved near the town center, and the rooms were ready for us when we got there (at 9am - fabulous). We went up and showered, and then came down for breakfast and planned the day.

We started by visiting the site of Chan Chan, a giant adobe city which was the principle site of the Chimu culture (800-1400ad or so). I visited the site in 2004 and it was great to be back. It's really an impressive area - walls which were originally 14 meters tall covered in sculpted clay figures and designs, giant courtyards, administrative areas, a huge central water pool, tombs of kings and unfortunate concubines, and much more yet to be found. We had a guide who spoke English, which is actually more of a problem than a help for me, because the English is often very difficult to understand and you don't get nearly as much detail that way. Andreas and I asked her questions in Spanish and got a bit more of the story. It was strange to hear that some of the interpretations that I had read about in the past have been revised - for instance, the cute little stylized sculpted critters which ring the main plaza are now supposedly squirrels instead of sea otters. Everything else there is about the sea, but now this amazing kingdom is worshiping squirrels??? I'm just not convinced. But such is the 'science' of archaeology... Stories change and evolve and it's difficult to ever really know what people intended.

After Chan Chan, we went to the beach town of Huanchaco and had a delicious lunch of ceviche and seafood. Yum! (for me anyway). We walked up and down the beach a bit and perused the tourist shops. A public mini-bus (combi) took us back towards Chan Chan and we stopped by the site's museum for a bit before heading back into town for some general bopping around. Dinner later was at a place that I used to go when I was here in 2004, and the same waiter was still working there. It was nice to be somewhere familiar, and the desserts were still as gorgeous as ever!

By the next morning, it was apparent that the ceviche (or something) had not agreed with P. He had been up all night with food poisoning, and decided to just stay in for the day to recover. Andreas had to touch base with family, so I headed out to the Moche site of Huaca de la Luna by myself. It is such a cool site - earlier than Chan Chan, with two giant adobe pyramids. Polychrome friezes decorate the walls with gruesome and vivid iconography. The Moche were really bloody, and human sacrifice was routinely practiced, especially during El Niño years. Singificant new discoveries have been made since I was last at the site, and it was great to see what they've uncovered. I had another deja vu moment when the guide turned out to be someone I remembered from the site. She got a kick out of the fact that I remembered her and kept asking what I thought of the 'new' discoveries. It was fun. I took a combi back to the hotel, which took three times longer than a taxi, but cost a tenth of the price and was darn good entertainment too. It's amazing how many folks they fit into the little combi vans, and they're always happy to pick up more!

When I got home, it was apparent that P was not getting better. In fact, he was much worse and we headed out to take him to the clinic. The doctors there admitted him and got him rehydrated and stablized, which was a huge relief (especially for him). I stayed with him for a couple of hours to help with translations and logistics, and then took off for a while so he could rest. After stopping by in the afternoon to make sure he was doing alright, he encouraged me to go ahead with our plans for a night bus to Lima, so at 8:30pm Andreas and I bailed him out of the hospital and we went to the bus station for the eight hour ride to Lima. P did great - he slept through the night on the bus and today he's much better. We still don't know what it was that made him so sick. I had the same ceviche and I did fine.... One of those travel mysteries I guess.

Here in Lima, we've reconnected with Steve and Scott and Luisa and Roc. They all arrived yesterday. We arrived this morning. The first three are already at the airport and are flying back to the states tonight. P and I will fly out tomorrow. Roc and Andreas are both staying on for a while to pursue other fun things in Peru.

Today was pretty casual - mostly shopping and wandering in Lima and catching up with each other's adventures. It's so strange to see everything coming to an end, but at the same time we're all pretty ready to get back to our 'normal' lives.

I owe you more descriptions and more tales from the cave, but I'm honestly pretty fried from the last few days and the night on the bus. I'll try to write tomorrow before heading to the airport, but it looks like the telling of the tales will have to continue after I'm back in the States.

Thanks for being patient with my stilted storytelling! This travelling business is a full time gig!

I hope all is well with you at home. My time in Peru is almost done (for this year at least).

Karen