We left Las Vegas 6am on the 27 of Sept. and arrived to Lima at 7pm after a short stop in Panama City. We flew with Copa Airlines, because they had the cheapest flight to Peru. This airline did not have the newest aircraft, but I have absolutely no regrets; they had only young and handsome male flight attandants, who served complementary alcoholic beverages with 2:1 alcohol to soft drink ratio. Oh boy, I am not in Utah anymore!! :))

The capital city of Peru is not an interesting place to visit; it is enormous, dirty and not particularly safe. Most people stop here 2-3 nights before they head to a more popular tourist destination. We did the same; we found a lovely guesthouse in a safe neighborhood, called Barranco, and had 2 relaxing days before we continued our journey to Cusco.

Barranco is a bohemian neighborhood with colorful houses and lots of cool graffiti.

The name Barranco  means ravine and refers to the neighborhood's topography; it was built in and around a ravine near a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Barranco and the neighboring Miraflores has 10 km long stretch of parks along the cliffs. It was nice to walk there a little bit, but as the weather was quite grey, we turned back after a couple of kilometers.

The next day we took the bus to the city center, but to be honest we wished we had stayed in Barranco. The main square, Plaza de Armas and the Monastery of San Francisco was nice, but after 2 hours walking around in the inner city we got very tired of the crowd, the smog and the constant honking, we could not wait to get back to the more laid-back Barranco.

The best part of Lima was the local cuisine; it is very tasty and cheap. We indulged ourselves in ceviche and pisco sour for 2 days.

Ceviche is fresh sea food cured in lime, onion and spices. It is accompanied by side dishes that complement its flavors, such as sweet potato, lettuce, corn. It is amazing!

Pisco sour is my new favorite drink, it is based on the Peruvian pisco liquor and comes in many flavors: clásico (with lime), chicha (with purple corn), maracuya, aguaymanto (cape gooseberry). All of them are very good, but if I had to choose, I would say the clásico is the best. Although we had a nice time in Barranco, I would not visit Lima again, because the city - apart from the good food - does not have much to offer.