Peru 2012 Day 3

Apparently I hadn't understood how bad traffic can be in Lima but when my ride who was suppose to arrive at 8:00am didn't show up until past 8:30 I began to see a little bit more about it. This time it was Cesar who got me and we took a taxi to the office. The taxi driver was a typical Peruvian or at least Liman driver. That means that he has no qualms pushing into other cars and the idea of lanes and traffic signals or signs basically meant nothing to him. Basically it appears that driving in Lima is like driving in Palermo on steroids. I can definitely say I expected to be in several accidents on the way to the office. I am not sure why everyone is in the rush they are that they obey no traffic rules at all but that is definitely the issue down  here. I am very glad they told me not to get a rental car. I would have shaved at least 15 years off my life that way. Driving in Sicily was on my own time frames so it wasn't much of an issue. To have to get somewhere by a specific time in this traffic would be awful and probably frightening.

Class started later than we had hoped but it got underway without much hitch and we made it to lunchtime having accomplished what I wished to get done. Today Luis took me to lunch and he drove me down to Larcomar which is a big outdoors mall about 15-20 minutes walk from my hotel and basically overlooks the Pacific Ocean (it is a little difficult to think of an ocean being to the west instead of east). I am not sure what the name of the restaurant was but it specialized in seafood he said. I ordered a grilled sea bass over mashed potatoes with fried asparagus and a red wine reduction sauce called corvina Miraflora I believe. Miraflora is the name of the district my hotel and the mall is in. It is a very touristy (and apparently therefore safe) area of Lima.  Luis also ordered us an octopus appetizer that had an interesting sauce with it. It was very good. We each also had a pisco sour. Pisco if you recall from my first visit to Peru is an alcoholic beverage something similar to a mild tequila.  In any event it was one and neither of us finished them. They add sour mix and froth and egg white over the top. It tastes reasonably ok if you like sour mix, which I do.

We got back to the office and started on the next segment of class which took us to about when I expected to end for the day and then Luis and I visited one of their customers right across the street from their office called Oncocare. They have a system that is having a couple problems and I took a look at it. I think we at least diagnosed one of the issues before the end of the day. The other might take some external help with my limited resources in Peru.  After that he drove me back to the area of Larcomar to show me how to walk there from my hotel. It was basically 2 turns and a straight shot after that. He drove me back to the hotel and I dropped stuff off and got cleaned up and headed down to Larcomar on foot.  It took between 15 and 20 minutes for me to walk there, probably on the lighter side of those numbers.

I scanned the various restaurants and decided on a place called Cafe Cafe.  I ordered a Cuscena Dark and a dish called Beer Chicken which had a special beer sauce, peppers and onions and was accompanied by a green rice. This dish was excellent and I would definitely order it again. The chicken was moist and properly cooked as was the rice and the waiter, George, gave me a spicy sauce called rocotto (or something like that) that was spicy enough for me and made the dish even more enjoyable. George was very friendly. He apparently lived in California for 10 years and his English was excellent. After dinner it was back to the hotel for the night. The weather held out as being cool and clear but the humidity was a bit high as I expect it to be the whole time here so I got back to the hotel nearly soaked in sweat from the walk.  I think I made it back about 8:30pm.  All in all for around 35 minutes of walking it was worth the trip. 

The pictures from today can be found here.