Buenos Aires - Lima

What do you get when you let loose a repressed shopper in Buenos Aires after many months of shoe deprivation and saving? SHOPPING BONANZA Argentina style!

Like many would-be travellers, I’d spent the past few months saving and scrimping for my trip, just waiting for that seemingly distant opportunity to finally spend again. Well, it was all worth the saving - Buenos Aires certainly did not disappoint.

If you have a chance to stopover in this beautiful city, I highly recommend it. It is very easy to get organise your own bus transfer on arrival, and it is just as easy to wander around the city yourself (and I have a shocking sense of direction...but I guess I can always sniff out the best shopping, no matter where it is in the world!!!). I found the gorgeous market area of Recoleta, which is great for jewellery, clothing and handmade wares, and managed to purchased way too many of all of these things.

I must admit I was very pleased for the fact that I speak some basic Spanish, as South America is definitely one destination where only English will not get you by. Luckily, I had completed a week of Spanish School in Guatemala on a previous trip, and it all came back to me (well, sort of) and that helped very much at the shops, restaurants and getting taxis/asking for directions. If you don’t have the chance to study Spanish before your trip, but if you make the effort to learn a few local words and phrases when you arrive, it will get you very far. The locals are very friendly and willing to help.

So, enough of the shopping and on to the tour - Tapir.

On arrival at Lima airport, I was tired and dirty and desperate for bed and a shower. Usually if there were hundreds of people screaming for me as I entered a room, I would feel like a celebrity, but as I entered the arrival hall at Lima airport around midnight, it was extremely daunting. Might I just say that I wanted to hug the lovely man with the Tucan sign that beared my name who was waiting to transfer me safely to the hotel. My hot tip is that the transfer from the airport to the hotel is worth every penny.

The hotel Kamana was very central, and most importantly at that point for me, had a hot shower and huge bed waiting for me.

The next day, I met my group for the first time....we took a short walking tour around Lima, then a few of us headed into the San Francisco Church and the catacombs, complete with the bones of around 25,000 people, including many monks from the church. You enter through a series of tunnels to see the catacombs (let’s just say I was pleased that I don’t suffer from claustrophobia) and being underground with all those bones was truly creepy enough.

We took a taxi to the coastal area of Mira Flores that afternoon - I wouldn’t say the beach is fantastic (black sand, rocks), but the view is pretty nice, and it is certainly a popular area for many Peruvian lovers who make out by the statue of love in the dedicated make out park.

This morning our tour properly began, with what I would definitely call an early start (7am), but I’ve been told to expect earlier!!!!! Hmmmm. Anyway, we made our way to the Ballestas Islands to see sea lions, penguins and boobies. There were lots of great photo opportunities. We pulled into Pisco this afternoon and checked into a lovely little hotel. I am very much looking forward to trying my first ¨Pisco Sour¨, which is the local alcoholic specialty, (and pretty strong I’m told).

Well, I’m off to the bar.

Salud!!!

Leonie