Report From Peru
We decided the family would go to Peru. Actually, my wife decided the family would go to Peru. All I did was nod knowingly because I didn’t have any better ideas. Nodding knowingly is great for marriages.
In the course of our travels we’d covered assorted islands, much of continental Europe and some of Asia. We’d been a puffin’s-throw away from the Arctic circle. We’d never been south of the equator.
When it came to South America only Argentina was on my personal wish list. It had caught my eye for no other reason than a Facebook friend seemed to go there a lot. He’d post photos of bottles of Malbec. I like Malbec. The dollar is strong there. Argentina made the list.
I didn’t know much about Peru. I knew they had Machu Picchu, a former half-Japanese president named Alberto Fujimori and a Mao-loving guerrilla movement called Shining Path.
My wife made her pitch. I listened, nodded knowingly, and the trip was set.
Here’s everything I learned, for your enrichment:
SAFETY
I was very concerned with safety in Peru especially since we were bringing the kids. Central and South America have no shortage of countries suffering from narco-violence, failing economies, rebel groups and Sean Penn-endorsed tyrants in Adidas tracksuits.
As it turned out, I’m not the only one with those concerns. Type “Is Peru” into Google and it reveals the most commonly asked questions:
Three questions are about safety. Two questions, “Is Peru a country” and “Is Peru in Mexico” make me sad like you can’t even imagine.
Is geography still taught in schools? Asking for a friend.
I also knew Peru has a guerrilla movement called Shining Path, a Maoist communist outfit. I guess they like Mao because he only killed millions of Chinese, not Peruvians. Unfortunately they live in the jungles to the north, so they haven’t heard that communism doesn’t work anywhere. Ever. A little research revealed my fears were unfounded: Membership numbers are pretty low these days. Stumbling around homeless with snakes and mosquitoes in high humidity clearly isn’t the draw it once was.
All that remained were my concerns about security in the cities that we’d be visiting. Some things I read concerned me, others comforted me. In the end I’d have to see for myself.
PERU
FOOD
I didn’t know many things about Peru. One of the many things I didn’t know was that they had amazing cuisine. I fell in love with a chicken dish called Aji de Gallina. That was just one of many amazing meals. Within ten minutes of landing back in the States we bought The Art of Peruvian Cooking and started looking up Peruvian restaurants.
BUREAUCRACY
Peru loves paperwork. Four family members staying in the hotel tonight? Here are four forms. Can one form cover the whole family? No, señor. Makes you wonder if government officials own stock in a paper mill.
Everything requires official documentation, which means you’ll take your passports with you everywhere rather than lock them up in the hotel safe. Even when buying bus tickets or day passes for Machu Picchu, you’ll need to drag your passports along. I guess they’re afraid of someone exploring a ruin under a fake name.
DOGS
Dogs! Dogs everywhere! Unleashed, unlicensed, unloved.
Nothing says “Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore” like packs of wild dogs standing atop piles of trash, shredding it and spreading it. They seem to be having a swell time, but it’s terrible for aesthetics.
TOURISM
Throughout the trip it was obvious that the Peruvian government and Peruvians themselves realize how beneficial tourism is for them. They clearly don’t want to mess it up. That means safeguards are in place to help ensure that travelers have a good experience. It also means that when you say no gracias to someone peddling his or her wares, they don’t follow you for an hour asking you to reconsider — as has happened to us in other places. Peru should do an inspiring TED Talk that other countries can learn from.
HAGGLING
Haggling at markets gave me the chance to practice two things I’m not very good at: Spanish and haggling. I thought I was doing pretty well bargaining for a t-shirt until the lady said, “Please sir, I have a baby.”
My heart melted and I gave up trying to save another 30 cents. Guess I’m no Donald Trump.
WEATHER
We were there in December. December is the rainy season. It’s also the “less people” season, which we truly enjoy. Lima was grey. Cusco was grey with occasional rain. Machu Picchu/Aguas Calientes had plenty of rain. But, lo and behold, the sun came out on the day we visited the complex. The guide said it was the first sunny day he’d had in a month. Obviously the Incan god Pachamama had taken a liking to me. Can’t blame her.
PISCO SOURS
Speaking of taking a liking: Pisco is the national booze— a clear, spirit derived from grapes. The government realized Pisco is a boon, so they keep creating Pisco-related holidays.
A Pisco Sour is pisco, lime juice (lemon for some), egg whites and bitters. Have one and fall in love with it. Have another and you’re well buzzed. Have a third and you’ll be calling it a noche in short order. Especially with the altitude difference in Cusco.
Neighboring Chile also produces pisco, which annoys the Peruvians. Any Frenchman will remind you there’s no such thing as “California Champagne” because it has to come from Champagne, France. Any Peruvian will insist that only Peruvian pisco is real because they have a province, town and river named Pisco.
The most passionate lecturer on the history of Pisco Sours and pisco itself can be found at the Palacio del Inka Hotel in Cusco. If I recall, he said he delivers the demonstration every evening.
GUINEA PIG
It’s a national staple. Yes, I ate it. And yes, I kept thinking of pet stores.
PERURAIL
When you’re headed to Machu Picchu, the national rail line will take you from Cusco’s Poroy Station through the Sacred Valley to the base village of Aguas Calientes. If you’re walking the Inca Trail you’ll get off earlier at Ollantaytambo (I almost spelled this correctly without looking).
You’ll see beautiful countryside during the ride, a lot of native women with kids strapped to their backs, and a lot of unfinished cinder block buildings with re-bar sticking out of the roof. The re-bar is there in case the homeowner saves up enough money to build another floor. The pails covering the re-bar are there to prevent rust, in case the saving up part takes longer than expected.
You’ll have to print your train tickets at one of the Perurail offices or kiosks because email delivery would be too convenient. If you’re taking luggage on the trip, they want to know about it. You actually have to ask for permission.
Bring passports. That should just be the national motto.
ALPACA
Also a staple. Yes, I ate it. It’s basically a cow that can make a sweater.
BED BEDLAM
We always book a hotel room for “two adults and two kids” - taking the “suite” option when it’s available and financially feasible. In all of our previous travel experience that means we get either two queen beds or a king bed with a sleeper sofa or space for a roll-away bed.
Alas, on two occasions in Peru we found the four of us standing before a single king bed with no sofa or roll-away available. This required me to man-up and argue in a firm but polite manner with the front desk.
WATER
Mexico has Montezuma’s revenge. Does Peru have Atahuallpa’s Revenge? I didn’t want to find out, so I avoided drinking tap water and licking door handles.
LIMA
I had a couple friends tell us we could pass on Lima. They described it as “boring” and they did that thing where you shrug and dismiss something with a wave of the hand.
They were wrong! We ignored their advice and checked it out. I’m glad we didn’t nod knowingly.
Lima has museums worth visiting, cathedrals, a catacomb with a lot of bones, excellent restaurants and ridiculous traffic. If you have the intestinal fortitude you can strap on a parachute with a guide and ride the thermals on the Miraflores seashore, waving to people as you pass by their 12th-story hotel room.
There’s a high-end local arts & crafts store called Dedalo in the Barranco area. If you want cool souvenirs, that’s where you go. You can also get a handmade Beatles tea set there, which is not the slightest bit Peruvian.
If you have kids, Lima has the most amazing place in the world according to my 8-year old. I’ll go into detail further on.
I strongly recommend this guidebook. It is worth thrice its weight in gold.
SECURITY IN LIMA
Like any big city, there are areas that you just don’t go to, so my sage advice is just don’t go to them. Being all a-feared of Lima because you heard reports of “dangerous” areas makes as much sense as being terrified of New York City because you heard the Bronx is bad. Just avoid the Bronx.
Lima clearly has problems with car theft. All apartment buildings have gated car parks with spike or razor-wire fences. It’s not particularly pretty but it must do the job because there were unstolen cars parked in them. Regardless, that kind of crime doesn’t affect me because I don’t own a car there.
At no time did I feel like we were in any kind of danger. We walked the streets in the Miraflores, Barranco and San Isidro districts. With kids. As much as I try to not stick out like a tourist, I’m tall and grey-haired and not-Hispanic or Mestizo-looking. My pale blond wife and pale blond kids aren’t fooling anyone either.
If you’re ever feeling lost or confused, seek out the Tourist Police. Their name is a little creepy, but they’re there to help.
TAXIS IN LIMA
When heading to the airport exit you’ll find a service that sets you up with a legit taxi, the fare based on destination. The dispatcher will point to one of the drivers (they wear credentials) and he’ll take you to his car.
The first time I used them, on arrival to Lima, it was flawless. The second time, on the return from Cusco, the dispatcher was trying to make us pay more by insisting that we needed a minivan. I walked away but was quickly approached by a credentialed driver from the same company. He offered his normal size car and normal size fare.
A lot of the taxis that roam the city can look pretty beat up and dirty. Fortunately, Lima is an Uber town. Uber was cheap and easy and quickly became our default way of getting around.
Bonus: By using Uber I discovered a place called “Jesus Maria” which is what my mother-in-law shouts when something goes wrong.
ASTRID & GASTON
If you’re looking for an amazing culinary experience, look no further. Also, take out a second mortgage if you do the tasting menu.
LIMA AIRPORT
Flying from Lima to Cusco? When we arrived we found a check-in line so long that it threatened to prohibit us from the timely attainment of our necessary boarding documentation. To make matters worse the convenient check-in kiosks were broken - rendering them inconvenient. Granted, it was a peak travel time, but be forewarned. It seemed a wee bit disorganized.
Airport security was the way it was in the good old days: simple and efficient.
THE PLACE YOUR CHILD WILL TALK ABOUT FOREVER
We promised our kids that if they behaved like precious little gentlemen during the trip they would be rewarded to with a visit to Divercity, a place I stumbled upon while researching Peru.
Their website is deplorable, so instead I’ll just direct you to images of it on Google. Imagine a mini-metropolis where kids can choose from numerous professions, wear uniforms, go to work and get paid “Divi Dollars” to spend on stuff. My kids were firefighters, radio DJs, propane technicians and supermarket clerks. The language barrier wasn’t too much of a problem, though it did preclude them from being journalists. That’s OK. Journalism doesn’t really exist anymore anyway.
Getting there took a short, inexpensive Uber from the hotel in Miraflores to the destination which is inside a very large shopping mall. There’s a great food truck court for lunch. If your kids allow you to go to lunch. Which they won’t.
Be prepared to spend hours at Divercity. Your children will not want to leave, but at some point the places closes and there’s no choice.
Machu Picchu might be a wonder of the world, but this is the place they’re going to tell all their friends about.
CUSCO
Cusco was the Incan capital before the Spanish showed up and kind of killed all the Incan royalty and kind of knocked down all the Inca palaces to build Cathedrals in the same spot. They also kind of trashed a bunch of Incan landmarks. The 16th Century Spanish were kind of bullies. Luckily they couldn’t bully Machu Picchu because it remained hidden until 1911, when it was discovered by a guy with degrees from Yale and Harvard. Ivy League guys always make the rest of us look bad.
Cusco is very high up. Even if you’re in shape, the simple act of climbing a staircase can leave you feeling like you’re on the last leg of the Boston Marathon. Drink the coca tea that you’re offered. It’ll help. Also, hotels have emergency O2 tanks if you’re really desperate. It takes a day or so to acclimate to the altitude. It takes much longer to acclimate to a Kardashian.
CORN
They love corn! It’s the best corn you’ve ever had, too! Hundreds of varieties. The kernels are enormous like a hippo tooth and meaty like a McNugget. It makes our tiny-kernel corn look sad. Sorry Iowa.
They’re so into corn that there are Incan carvings of guys holding corn or holding a staff with corn at the end. And an axe head. Talk about mixed messages. Lunch! Die!
They serve salted, dry corn in bowls at the bar, corn in salads, they boil corn on the side of the road. Corn!
SAFETY
There wasn’t a single instance where I was concerned about safety in Cusco. There was a beheading the the main square near the hotel that would have been cause for alarm, except it happened in 1533. And it was the Spanish who did it. Stop bullying!
JESUS APPARENTLY LOVED GUINEA PIG
According to paintings in the art museum and in the cathedral on the main square, The Last Supper consisted of roast guinea pig and purple corn beer. And that is why you travel.
AYAHUASCA
For a lot of folks, drinking jungle juice in order to have a GMO-free mega-hallucination is one of the highlights of visiting Peru. I was somewhat turned off of the idea after hearing Howard Stern sidekick Robin Quivers share her experience: she vomited, felt all the sadness in the world and wept for four hours. Fun!
Even if I wanted to try it, there’s no way to properly take care of your kids when tripping on plant drugs.
The man we hired to take us around the Sacred Valley was a native and swore by the ayahuasca ceremony. But he was adamant that people wanting to do it should do plenty of research on who will be conducting it. His advice was to avoid the tourist places that offer it as part of their menu of activities (i.e.: “ATV rentals! Inca tours! Ayahuasca!”).
You want a real shaman and a real ceremony, he said. He told us of mountebanks who served fake preparations of the drink to people who were back in the city nightclubbing a few hours after their “ceremony.” That’s an impossibility if you’d actually gone to a real shaman. Do your homework, druggie!
COCA LEAF
The coca leaf gets a bad rap thanks to the powder version that American supermodels consume instead of food. Despite the fact that it takes a tremendous amount of the leaf to make a toot of Schedule II Colombian nose candy, U.S. Customs considers the leaf a big no-no, in case you think you want to bring some home.
That’s too bad, because in addition to helping you adjust to the altitude in Cusco, they’re fun to chew and loaded with free vitamins and minerals that GNC would charge you for. I was told that the locals have remarkably good teeth due to their constant chewing of the calcium-rich leaf.
In addition to dried coca there’s coca candy, coca gum, coca chocolate and coca tea. At the very least you should drink the coca tea. You can bring the coca tea and candy back with you because it’s not a scary dried leaf.
This I learned: If you let your child chew coca leaf before bedtime, bedtime will be indefinitely postponed. It’s like nature’s Red Bull.
THE NATIVES
They’re the descendants of the Incans! They’re not particularly tall! They dress very colorfully. They have a pretty tough existence. The women carry everything on their backs. Everything. By the time they’re 40 their spines have often gone full Quasimodo.
There’s not a lot of money in the countryside. They come into Cusco to peddle their wares. Or beg. They will pose with you in their traditional outfits, often with a baby alpaca. Payment is voluntario but it’s best to negotiate beforehand.
AGUAS CALIENTES
I thought it meant “Hot Waters” but Aguas Calientes means “Hot Springs.” So I learned something.
It’s a tourism town that owes its existence to Machu Picchu. There’s lots of construction going on. More stray dogs. It won’t take long before you know the whole town like the back of your hand, because the whole town is roughly the same size as the back of your hand.
During our stroll my kids found a field and decided they wanted to take on some locals for a friendly game of futbol. It didn’t take long before the myth of American exceptionalism was shattered - at least with regard to soccer. If you’re scouting for a professional team and you see a three-foot tall kid with a #7 jersey, hire him. That kid was muy good.
Even though the local Soccer Lords humiliated my Yanqui children, I rewarded the whole gang with cold bottles of sports drink afterward. It wasn’t very expensive and seemed like a very American thing to do.
You can find a few good restaurants In Aguas Calientes. The Inkaterra Hotel was a nice stay once I was able to convince them that their concept of a “premium” room left a little to be desired.
A MEAN TOURIST TRIED TO UGLY-SHAME THIS DOG.
WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL INSPIRE YOU.
The ugliest dog in the world lives in Aguas Calientes. I don’t know if it’s an alien breed or a tame chupacabra or just suffering from mange. I do know that it’s most definitely a he because his testicles were the size of a Passat.
The good news is this dog actually has a home, because one of the children who destroyed my kids’ self-esteem in soccer gave it a big hug and proudly announced, es mi perro!
MACHU PICCHU
Machu Picchu means “Old Peak.”
What that tells us is that while the Inca had a near supernatural ability to build world wonders, when it came to actually naming them they were like, “Just call it whatever.”
You’ll need to buy tickets for admission. To buy tickets you’ll need your passport, of course. To get to the top you have the choice of hiking or taking the Somewhat Terrifying Bus which leaves regularly from Aguas Calientes. It winds its way up the mountain, giving you bowel-liquefying views of the sheer drop that would kill you if the driver gets distracted. If you have an active imagination, prepare to indulge yourself in one frightening fantasy after another.
There are no guardrails, just small stones painted yellow to delineate where the road ends and your death begins.
STONEWORK
Assuming you’ve survived the Somewhat Terrifying Bus ride and you’re now inside Machu Picchu, you will look around and begin to wonder “How in Pachamama’s green earth did they pull this off?”
It’s nuts.
Enormous chunks of stone, weighing multiple tons, quarried far away, pushed down a mountain, dragged up a mountain, perfectly placed and precision-chiseled with 15th Century tools by short, corn-loving people.
And it’s not only an engineering feat. The positioning also shows an advanced understanding of astronomy. The mind boggles.
Stunning feats of construction. Meanwhile, I have 21st Century cordless power tools, smartphone apps and a laser-level, yet I can’t properly construct a simple garden shed out of two-by-fours. It hurts.
The Inca reserved their very best stonework for the temples, because the gods paid more, I guess. The lesser stonework - incredible, regardless - was for less god-like things such as homes, classrooms and corn storage.
THE SACRED VALLEY
To get to Machu Picchu one must travel through the Sacred Valley. There are numerous sites in the valley, many of them are well worth seeing. I fear some folks just go from Cusco to Machu Picchu and call it a trip. They’re missing out.
Travel the valley and see terraced gardens clinging to the sides of steep mountains. Inca village ruins perched overhead. Enough agave to start a tequila company, except they don’t for some reason. A zillion varieties of potatoes. I even saw fields of quinoa, which I though only existed in Whole Foods.
Every site blows your mind in a different way. These guys just loved building things. It’s like they knew that hundreds of years later people would stand there scratching their heads and asking, “Seriously, how did they do that?”
To explore the Sacred Valley there are group tours where you board a bus or private tours where they take you in a minivan. We made it to Ollantaytambo, Pisac and Moray. There are several other sites.
STREET PARTIES
They like to party! They can dance! And when it’s time to dance, they have no qualms about making Main Street the dance floor. During our Sacred Valley drive we encountered a village’s birthday party parade and got to take a lot of pictures because el cars no move-o for forty minutos.
CAR SEATS
Not necessary. You just put your kids in the back of the truck.
NATURE’S SEWING KIT
One of the cooler things I’ve seen was our guide showing us how the Amerindians use nature to their advantage. He went to an agave leaf, pulled on a thorn, and slowly pulled it out. It had a long, strong plant fiber attached and when it dried, he said, it was as good as a needle and thread.
So if you ever find yourself in the middle of nowhere with an agave plant and a hole in you pants, you can thank me.
In conclusion: If someone suggests Peru for your next big trip, I hope this was enough information for you just not just nod knowingly, but enthusiastically.
Don’t forget your passports.
