The title says it all! Our experience of Lima was limited to the airport, but if the whole city is like that, it must be the suckiest city on Earth, if not the entire Solar System (maybe even the entire Orion arm of the Milky Way…).

We arrived in the airport with a few hours to spare, went through security (after paying our departure tax, a fixture of Latin American travel.), and then found that there was nowhere to eat, and let me tell you, we were hungry. The security dude told us that we’d have to get our departure tax receipt revalidated, but that’s no problem, we thought, right? WRONG YOU FOOL! DON’T YOU KNOW THAT YOU’RE IN THE LIMA AIRPORT!?!?!?!?!?! So, at any rate, it wasn’t that easy. We had to either pay them the tax again, or go and talk to the head of airport security. We tracked down the “jeffe,” as he was called, and he told us to go and fill out a form with our airline. So we did that, then we went back to the jeffe, and he scanned our tax receipts, and sent us on our way. That’s it! He scanned them on a computer and filed away the sheets we’d filled out.

So, to reiterate, we had to find some jeffe dude, fill out forms, and run around the airport, as our flight was leaving in twenty minutes, all just so that we could walk through a little gate. Yeah, the Lima airport sucks (and I’m just telling you one of the various stories to illustrate this point, not the ones about making us find and recheck our luggage for no apparent reason, taking away our water and sunscreen after they said they wouldn’t, not having ANY water fountains, so you HAVE to buy water, or the one where they suck so much that they disappear into a vacuum of their own suckiness.).

Anyhow, on to greener (mountainous) pastures – Cusco! We really loved this city. It’s got a real precolumbian, Inca feel to it, but also tons of beautiful churches. Cusco was the capital of the Inca empire, and the city was laid out in the shape of a jaguar (Cool huh? I think the NYC planners should redesign their city to look like a giant apple.). The food was really good, and often ridiculously cheap (think $2 each for: soup, tea, an entree with vegetables, and fruit), Joyce and I discovered after eating at some expensive places. We wandered all around Cusco, bought some local artwork, and soaked in the local culture. We could see children practicing a dance from our hotel, and then one day, we saw them giving a huge show. It was very cute!

We also went to Qoricancha, the Inca Temple of the Sun, and then a Dominican abbey. This is one of the most amazing pieces of architecture that I’ve ever seen. The Incas cut each stone to fit perfectly against the stones next to it, so that they needed no mortar, and their walls were still impenetrable! It’s just so cool!

We wholeheartedly endorse visiting Cusco! It’s great, and the area around it is fabulous too, as we discovered on our trek. But, more about that in the next post.