Guayaquil & Lima

Guayaquil

We got into Guayaquil from Baltra and were met by our guide Pilar.  She told us that we have a tour of the city.  Given the early morning start and the many disturbed nights at the Galapagos, a city tour was the last the thing on our minds.

However, like good tourist we went along with the tour.  We went to the water front and say the many improvements and development to the city scape.  We then went to the Iguana Park and patted some iguanas.  This was very nice.  Then we went to the oldest part of the city where the city council has done lots of refurbishment to make it nice for tourist.  They have certainly done a fantastic jobs.  The older wooden houses were really nicely done up.  The old wooden balconies were fabulous.  The government is certainly doing a lot of improve and develop the place.

Finally we were taken to our hotel which was very nice.  The first thing we had to do was checkin for our flight to Lima.  Meryl did not have any problems checking in online but for some mysterious reason it did not like my name and would not allow me to do online checkin.  With a little help form the hotel staff, this problem was solved.

We decided to have dinner at the hotel cafe and ran into the lovely french couple waiting with us at Balta airport.  We exchanged Galapagos experiences.  We were interested to note that they stayed at 3 islands and did day trips and walks.  The wife was very enthusiatic about Isabella Island and said that Casa de la Marita is the place to stay.

Another early start to get to the airport for our flight to Lima.  The flight was uneventful.  At Lima Airport we were met by Angie (she is half chinese half peruvian spanish).  She took us to Casa Andina in Miraflores.  Lima airport has certainly changed since I was last here 25 years ago.  The traffic was pretty slow as there was a lot of road works. 

After checking in we went for a walk towards the sea. The coastline was quite foggy.  We were told that it was due to the Humbolt current.  We saw a very large sculpture of The Lovers.  We also saw a newly couple getting their photos taken.

Miraflores is definitely the place to be at for Lima.  The place for upwardly mobile Lima residents.  There are a lot of construction going on.  We had lunch at a cafe just around the tourist area.  We went into a few souvenir malls to check out the local crafts.  We went into a park and nearby church. 

In the evening we discovered that it being Saturday, there was a local market in the park.  There were many stalls with interesting wares.  There was even an open air movie being screened, it was a Laurel & Hardy movie with the characters speaking spanish.  It was rather nice.

The whole area was rather interesting.

Dinner was at a small cafe frequented by locals.  It was really cheap and nice food but far too much.  I felt quite bad about leaving so much food uneaten.  It was a set dinner with soup and fried fish and chips & rice.

Back to the hotel to get ready for our flight to Cuzco.