Day 2: Lima, Peru *UPDATE*

Day 1 in Lima!  I actually slept pretty good last night...bunk bed with one thin sheet and I guess what you would consider a pillow... ; )  It is really hot and humid here so the window was open.  And since this hostel is literally int he middle of Miraflores, it was ridiculously loud all night (sirens and horns honking and cats fighting - lots of stray cats and dogs around here), but I was so tired I didn´t care - woke up feeling pretty rested! The girls who I was bunking with got up early and left for Cuzco.  They were from France and seemed nice enough, but I didn´t really talk to them more than to roll over and say hi, where are you from. 

So a "free breakfast" is included in my hostel so I got my little coupon for it from the front desk and walked down the street and around the corner to the little restaurant, El Parqueitto. 

Turns out free breakfast is a glass of juice, two pieces of toast, and a fried egg.  Beats nothin´I guess!  You´d think I would´ve learned with all the travling not to drink anything that isn´t straight out of an unopened bottle, but the juice just looked so good (and it was) so I drank it - mango I think!  Doing fine so far so it must have been okay!! :)

After breakfast I set out on foot to see the area.  No one has been overly nice or welcoming here like some of the other places I´ve been, but they aren´t mean either and I haven´t felt unsafe or threatened at all.  I picked up a couple of girl hitchikers a few weeks back (in Tahoe) that happened to be from Lima and they told me not to wear shorts here.  They were right...I don´t think I´ve seen one girl with shorts on around here.  They practically wear nothing on top (short, tight tanktops) but always jeans or at least long capris.  So no shorts for me either.  And with my glasses on, I really don´t think I stick out at all! I walked around for awhile and looked in some shops, found a little grocery store and managed to buy some bottled water.  Spanish isn´t nearly as hard to understand and speak as some of the other languages.  I don´t think I even picked up one word of Vietnamese when I was in Vietnam.  Just too hard.  I´m doing okay with my Spanish...it´s coming back to me pretty quick :) Here are some pictures of where I walked in Lima...

After walking around, I went back to the hostel and changed for the beach and paragliding.  There was too strong of a cross-wind this morning, so while I was waiting around for them to decide if I could go or not, I did some shopping (of course).   Turns out the bikinis down here are a little on the skimpy side...LOL!  They pretty much have a non-existent butt...I mean it literally covered like not even half of mine!  So I opted for some board shorts and a couple of cute tank tops instead.  I know, I know...just what I needed huh...more clothes! :)  Anyways, the wind wasn´t changing so I went to a surf shop, rented a board and made a new friend, and hit the ocean.  The water was surprisingly warm, and surfing was surprisingly hard.  Even paddling out is a struggle!  Standing up is nearly impossible...although I did manage to make it up once for like .2 seconds. :)  I´m planning on going to another nicer beach about 30 minutes south of Lima tomorrow to maser my surfing skills! ;) 

I met a new girl here at the hostel named Magdalena from the Czeck Republic.  She is 26 and has been traveling through South America for almost a month now by herself - she´s going to go with me to surf tomorrow!  SEE!!  I´m not the only crazy girl out there who travels alone!  I did meet two older couples from California while in Lacomar (a shopping area on the beach) who asked ¨what a little girl from Kansas was doing in Peru by herself¨ I responded ¨seeing the city just like you¨and they just gave me a weird look...haha :)

I walked back to the hostel (making sure I knew who was walking behind me!) from the beach around 6pm (wanted to make it back before dark) and the paragliding people called and said the winds were changing so they would come pick me up at the hostel and take me to the cliff.  I asked how I would know who they were, and they just told me to wait on the curb...haha.  So there I was, just sitting on a curb in front of my hostel in Lima at 6pm - and every single freakin´car that drove by stopped and asked if I needed a taxi.  Finally a jeep pulled up with a white guy and a Peruvian girl and he said ¨Terri?¨ I nodded my head yes and he pointed to the back seat so I just hopped in!  The guy was Michael and the girl was Christina - they run this little paragliding operation I guess.  Michael´s mom is from Texas so he spoke pretty good English.  We got to the sight (the cliffs) right at sunset and it was just beautiful!  I got some pretty good pics! 

He got all of his equipment out, strapped me in with him, and we just jumped off a cliff right over the Pacific Ocean!!  SO COOL!  It wasn´t really all that exilerating, pretty slow ride to the beach, about 5 or 10 minutes or so I would guess, but it was still pretty cool! :)  They just dropped me off back here at the hostel...actually they dropped me off on the other side of Kennedy Park and asked me if I could walk back to the hostel.  Wasn´t too thrilled because it´s dark now but I said I could find my way...and thankfully I did!  It was only like 2 blocks away. :)

Okay - well I´m off to shower and then Magda and I are going out with some other people here at the hostel to some jazz club or something?  I don´t know, just along for the ride and some fun! :)

That´s it for today! I´ll write more tomorrow...

-TK

Day 1: Lima, Peru

Hola!  (Gotta practice my espanol) Just made it to my hostel in Lima, Peru, so thought I´d send out a quick email before I go to bed (it´s midnight...WAY past my bedtime!)  Thankfully they have one working (very slow and old) computer with internet access here!!

Left KC for Houston at 12:15 this afternoon on the smallest little puddle jumper plane I think I´ve ever been on.  I was taking my sweet time at the airport in Houston - got totally ripped off by the currency exchange place getting Peruvian money, walking around looking at things and eating lunch - and damn near missed my flight!  They boarded really early and by the time I lolly gagged around to the gate it was almost completely boarded.  So of course there was NO room on the plane for my two carry-on backpacks (all my luggage).  I did luck out and not have anyone in the middle seat next to me so I somehow managed to shove one under the middle seat and the other one the flight attendant took and had to put it in some closet up front I guess.  7 hour flight to Lima.  I watched a couple of movies:  Australia (pretty good but wouldn´t pay to see it in a theater) and Twlight (kind of weird but it´s a love story so it was okay :) )  We hit some pretty good turbulents over the Andes...pretty sure the plane dropped for a good two seconds at least...everyone was gasping and grabbing things.  LOL...Shannon you probably would´ve passed out!  Other than that, smooth flight and not as long as I thought it would be. 

When I got off the plane in Lima,  there was a HUGE line to get through immigration...it had like 9 switchbacks, each about 50 feet, just lined with people.  Took about 45 minutes to get to the front of the line, and when I did, the jerk immigration guy took one look at my little sheet I had filled out and circled this one line I had missed at the bottom and pointed to the back of the line. Oh hell no...I wasn´t about to go to the back for that.  So I move back out of the way a little bit and then realized I didn't have a pen.  So I go back and ask (and motion because I´m pretty sure he didn´t speak a lick of English) that I don´t have a pen.  He just shook his head no and pointed to the back of the line again.  I so would´ve kicked that guy if there wasn´t a desk right there!!  Some nice lady in line had a pen and was watching the whole thing...so I freaking wrote "USA" on the form and walked right back up to him.  Haha...he didn´t say anything, just stamped my passport and slid it back...jerk. ;)

So once I made it through the airport drama, it was on to the fun part...finding a taxi to take me to my hostel in Miraflores (an area of town)!  Haha...this is always the biggest challenge because there are some many people trying to rip you off (especially tourists) at the airport!  Luckily (I always get lucky on my crazy trips) I found a nice guy named Jorge to take me.  He had a cross and a picture of Jesus hanging from his rear view mirror so that made me feel a little better.  He seemed really nice so I got in : )  Turns out he didn´t speak english...LOL!  I think he asked me how my flight was and I said bien (good) and he just kept talking.  I kept saying ¨"no intiendo - no habla espanol - tu habla ingles¿" and he always laughed and said no and just kept talking in spanish!  What part of "I don´t understand - I don´t speak Spanish" did he not get!?  So anyways, I sat in the front seat because I get motion sickness pretty easy, and that was a mistake.  You think I´m a crazy driver!?  You should get in for a ride in Lima with THIS guy!  I totally should´ve just sat in the back seat, held on tight, and shut my eyes!  He literally drove down the middle of the road - I mean RIGHT down the middle.  And if there were two cars in the right lanes, he´d just honk his horn and split them.  Ya know I think I must have a sign on my back when I land in foreign countries that says "I want the craziest taxi driver there is" because I swear this always happens to me!  But whatever, we made it.  Lima is just another big city...pretty dirty, saw some beggers, some hookers, lots of graffiitti and some casinos.  They actually have Pizza Hut, Starbucks, TGI Fridays, Burger King and even Chili's!  Plenty of places to find some normal grub if Peruvian food turns out to not be good.  We drove right along the coast and since I had my window down so I didn´t throw up on Jorge my crazy driver, I could here the big waves crashing up on the shore...it was so nice! 

So my hostel is in the heart of Miraflores (the tourist district) and is called Flying Dog Hostel...haha...   Hey it´s $8 per night and I´sharing a room with three other girls (who are already asleep) so I´m not complaining. 

I think I'll hit the beach tomorrow and maybe paraglide off these beatufiul cliffs around here - heard it´s really cheap!  Then I'm thinking I might go to Cuzco on Tuesday to get to Macchu Picchu.  Who knows...it´s all kind of still up in the air for now...more fun that way...haha! I´ll keep ya posted : )

But I´m here and I´m safe and I´ve met some cool young people so I´m all good!  That´s all I really wanted to say...sorry it turned it to another one of my novels!  ; )  More to come...

-TK


PS - the keyboards down here are different (it´s so weird!?) and I´ve hit the wrong keys at least 50 times already so sorry if there are really bad punctuation errors! :)

Family in Tahoe

Well, my time in Tahoe is coming to an end!  It's been an awesome 18 months out here, but I'm heading it back to Kansas.  I turned in my THREE MONTHS notice in November, so my last day working here in Tahoe is Febraury 28th!  To help me move back home celebrate, my parents came out for a visit, along with my brother and several friends. 

My parents drove so they could move stuff back for me (along with a rented UHaul AND my SUV - I have a lot of stuff).  Some friends flew in early to Reno, but six flew in to Sacramento a day later.  Ashley (a friend who flew in earlier) made the two hour drive with me to Sacramento to pick them up.  It was a JAM PACKED car, and of course I got pulled over for speeding back in Incline Village.  The officer didn't believe that I actually had 8 seatbelts in my car, but after shining some flash lights around and being satisified, he did let me off with just a warning.   (Add it to my list of warnings...)  We enjoyed some time in the hot tub that night (and doing snow angels - bad idea).

I really worked hard to make sure it would be a cheap trip for everyone.  My boss let us stay at his penthouse condo at Northstar (with 5 bedrooms / 10 beds), and a couple of ski school friends helped me get skis and boots for everyone coming!  I even secured some free ski passes from my boss' friend!  Now that's what I call a cheap free ski trip!


8 sets of skis/poles in my little apartment

We hit the ground running the next morning and set off for some skiing at Northstar.  ONCE AGAIN, I got pulled over for speeding in Incline Village.  And ONCE AGAIN, I managed to get a warning.  I've honestly never seen a car so packed in my life, 8 people and 8 sets of skis.  Come on.  I think the cop just feld bad for us, haha! 

Leaving the Incline Village  house for the condo at Northstar



(Rest of post coming soon...)