Hopping from Lima toward Lake Atitlán (part 1, Lima to Paracas)

Paracas National Reserve

Until a few months ago I had never heard of PeruHop, a bus company styled after the well-known red Hop On / Hop Off buses that allow tourists worldwide to explore a city's sights for one set fare. PeruHop (and its extension, BoliviaHop) operates on the same principle: You buy one set-fare ticket for a given route (say Lima to Arequipa or Lima to Cuzco), and then you can choose to step off the bus in places where you'd like to spend a day or two or six. You hop on and off. All you need to do is let the operators know no later than 12 hours before the departure of the bus that you want a seat. Genius!

Arriving in Lima shortly after sunrise

After arriving in Lima eight hours late (and in the wee hours of Wednesday instead of at a civil time Tuesday evening, thanks to yet another mechanical issue that delayed my DFW to MIA flight enough to miss my Lima connection) I spent my first few hours in Peru's capital trying to catch up on a couple of hours of sleep. Thankfully, I had been able to change my hotel shuttle, the QuickLlama, as well as my hotel arrival to the ungodly time of 5:00 a.m., and so the fallout was limited to being just a bit on the tired side. (The business class flights from Miami to Lima do not feature lie-flat seats, and even those domestic first class seats become a bit uncomfortable after five hours of flying. I know, complaints, complaints—but the one complaint that really counts, the one I sent off to AA, has already yielded 15,000 miles.)

By mid-morning I felt fit enough to go for a long walk through the Miraflores neighborhood where my hotel, the Casa del Viajero, was located. I had been in the same general area a few years back when I worked the Pan-American BMX Championships, and just like back then I enjoyed the many small parks, pretty homes, and bustling streetlife of this well-to-do district.

Of course, the highlight of the day came in the form of my meeting up with Gino, with whom I had formed a friendship on my last visit to Peru. He had been my liaison with the local race organization and he had shown me the old, central part of Lima. Over the past two years we had stayed in occasional WhatsApp contact, and so, in the run-up to this trip, we had made arrangements to get together, even if the time was tight. Gino picked me up at the hotel and took me to a nice seafood restaurant, the Punto Azul. He treated me to an amazing lunch of grilled octopus and a mixed ceviche, accompanied by two piscos sour (tamano catedral, as they call the big ones here). Afterward, we hit a taproom across the street before heading to microbrewery #500 on my list, the aptly named La Cerveceria. Gino got a real kick out of being part of my reaching this milestone, and I couldn't have asked for a nicer person to share it with.

The next morning it was time to start my trip proper with the PeruHop bus. My pick-up time at the hotel had been set for 6:40 a.m. to 6:50 a.m., and when the bus didn't show up I had a few tense moments since all my hotel reservations and pre-paid excursions hinged on my traveling onward on time. But it turned out that there had been a delay because of the large number of passengers, and 45 minutes later we were on the road, initially picking up more passengers from their hotels and then weaving our way through Lima's heavy traffic, heading south.

Our big, modern motorcoach was packed with 48 passengers, plus of course the driver as well as Charley, our pleasant tour guide. She gave us a quick overview of the day's trip and then proceeded to meet with each one of us, check what our final destination with PeruHop was going to be, where and for how long we would stay for the night. I can't remember exactly how many different nations were represented in our bus that day, but I would venture that the number was close to 20. The passengers ranged in age from young backpacker types (some single, some in groups) to middle-aged couples as well as old farts like me. I sat next to a mid-30ish woman from Italy, Marianna, but she had partied too hard the night before and we didn't talk much.

The drive out of Lima was fairly blah, with the marine layer casting a greyish blanket onto the utterly colorless landscape. Once in a while we could see the Pacific, separated from us by huge stretches of brownish beach that on the other side of the highway climbed into brownish hills. Without direct sunlight and a blue sky it looked rather depressing.

Charley, our tour guide on that day, introducing the caballero

For most of the drive we didn't see much color in the landscape, except for about a half hour after our breakfast stop at Mirasur, a large roadside restaurant and centro de eventos, when we rolled through an artificially irrigated area with lots of fields. Our breakfast stop didn't entail just the typical pan y chicharrón (pork in a bread pocket with some potatoes and red onion), but we were also treated to a 10-minute performance by a caballero who made his horse do some fancy "dance." More unusual was the tombola performance by a guinea pig in a special pit with numbered holes where the cuy eventually seeks shelter from those observing this Andean type of roulette. It was quite hilarious, and the guinea pig didn't seem to mind too much. Onward we went.

In total, we drove about three-and-a-half hours to Paracas, located some 160 miles south of Lima on the coast. For me (and most of the other hopsters) this town presented the first stop of the trip. Charley had filled us in on certain free activities that are part of the PeruHop pass, and after checking into my hotel, the Bamboo Lodge right on the small malecón, with a room overlooking the fishing harbor, I joined several other hopsters in the free mixology lesson where we learned how to create the perfect pisco sour.

With my scheduled Golden Shadows excursion still an hour away I had lunch in one of the many small restaurants lining the boardwalk. This is of course prime seafood terrain, and I had a Peruvian dish called causa.Think of the creamiest mashed potatoes you have ever had, layered with tomatoes and avocado and topped with a huge portion of crabmeat, elegantly garnished with egg wedges and tomatoes. Wow! It was as delicious as it looked, and for a lunch it was more than filling!

When I had bought my PeruHop pass I had been offered various excursions and activities at prices far below what one would find on Viator or GetYourGuide, and I spent quite a few hours working out a schedule for this trip. For this first day, in Paracas, I had booked a late-afternoon hike in the Paracas National Reserve, a huge area of what presents the northern part of the Atacama desert. We were about 20 participants, and since this presented a rather large group the usual van did not hold everyone and a taxi was called into service—and I ended up with the best seat, riding shotgun. It was about an hour to reach the starting point of our hike, over horribly bad roads that have been broken down by decades of heavy truck traffic. The Reserve was established long after sea salt production had started in this area, and this business is still thriving, meaning that the few tourists share the road with massive salt-hauling trucks.

If you look closely you can make out the flamingos

The point where we started our trek up to the cliffs overlooking the Pacific was literally in the middle of nowhere—no sign, no ice cream vendor, no nothing. We just stopped. I was much reminded of northern Mexico's desert landscapes, only on an even more vast and deserted scale. For as far as the eye reaches, there is nothing but low hills and plains in dozens of shades of grey and brown.

Our guide gave us a short briefing. The plan was to hike up the inland side of the cliffs, walk along the rim, and at 6:00 p.m. end up at a spot where we would witness the sunset. When I had booked the trip I had thought that this would be a cakewalk in the park, so to speak, but it turned out to be physically demanding and not without the ever-present danger of slipping on one of the steep and loose descents. One middle-aged couple had some difficulties, and the guide, Christian, had to give them a helping hand; at other times he had to remind people not to get too close to the steep cliffs. Well, he didn't need to tell me: At times, the wind blew very hard and I was not going to be thrown off balance and get in line for more internal hardwear! I certainly was glad that my Merrells have aggressive soles, and even so there were moments when I took tiny baby steps to make sure I wasn't going to slip. From what I could tell, aside from what looked like an ancient (maybe just weathered?) woman from Israel I was by far the oldest person of our trek.

The vistas on our two-mile, two-hour excursion were spectacular. The swells of the Pacific pound the coast, and the eroded cliffs glow in all kinds of gorgeous, soft colors. Crimson, red, gold, greenish tones—it's difficult to describe. The closer the sun got to the horizon, the softer the shadows became while the colors took on more and more intensity. I would say that the last half hour before the actual sunset was the most spectacular, even though seeing the big red globe plunge into the ocean is always memorable. Our two vehicles had worked their way close to our sun-spotting location, and an hour later we were back in town.

You can probably tell which one I am—the gimpy one!

For dinner, I had a nice corvina off the grill and finished the day with another pisco sour, which is quickly starting to become a favorite of mine! Paracas closes its sidewalks fairly early, and so I spent another satisfying hour sitting on my veranda, listening to the soft sounds of gentle waves lapping the fishing boats while enjoying a good-night glass of the bottle of tempranillo that the flight attendant on my last flight had slipped to me, well-disguised in a grey trash bag. Some FAs still remember the way things worked 15 years ago....

When I had booked my boat trip to Ballestas Islands weeks ago I had opted for a tour that left Paracas at 10:00 a.m. instead of 7:30 a.m., knowing full well that I would want to enjoy my breakfast and that there would be a chance of a marine layer that would have to burn off. Good call: When I started my excellent breakfast sitting at one of the hotel's tables on the malecón the haze of the morning started to burn off, and by the time the boat left we had ample sunshine.

Some tout Las Ballestas as a miniature Galapagos, but I think that may be a small stretch of the imagination. Of course, I haven't been to the Galapagos and they may just be overhyped, but even though we saw (and smelled) a whole bunch of seabirds and saw (and heard) an impressive colony of sea lions these islands didn't come close to what I have seen reported from the archipelago. Still, it was a worthwhile excursion, and the sea lions were truly impressive, as was the landscape. Our guide gave a nice narrative of the history of the guano industry as well as the importance of the islands as part of the Paracas National Reserve. The boat captain made sure that everyone got a good look at everything noteworthy, slowly (and around the rocks especially carefully) spinning the lancha around so that we could all take our photos.

Apart from the wildlife we also saw El Candelabro, a large earthen feature on one of the hillsides the origins of which are shrouded in mystery. Like all tour guides, ours gave some tantalizing explanations (connection to the Nazca lines? markings by el liberador José de San Martín for whatever reason he may have had? aliens?) that all sounded somewhat improbable. Quien sabe ....

With the day's tourist portion behind me it was time for lunch (another Peruvian specialty, a jalea mixta, which is translated into "mixed jellyfish" but rather is thin fillets of fish jowls (or cheeks) that are extremely tender. The presentation, as seems to be the norm, was exquisite. After this huge lunch I somehow ended up at Paracas' one and only taproom, Karamba, which had several IPAs on tap. As things were slow, Andrés, the server, struck up a conversation that later on also involved mountain guide Caly, and that segued into dinner with Anika from Germany who had been in our pisco mixology class the day before. It's easy to socialize in these parts.

To close down this contribution to the Chronicles I'll mention the free bus tour of the Paracas National Reserve on Saturday morning, after checking out of the Bamboo Lodge and before heading for Huacachina. I really have to give it to PeruHop: They include—for free—some activities that especially the younger backpack crowd might otherwise forego thanks to limited funds. (In our pub conversation the night before it had become clear that today's young globetrotters have more funds to play with than we did 50 years ago, and there is the miracle of the credit card, which beats the hell out of a Western Union Moneygram! Still, money is money.)

Our two-hour tour included three spots, all of which offered spectacular views of the rough coastline. Our guide, Jerry, gave some rambling explanations, obviously more interested in cozying up to a rather buxom female hopsterette than providing a cohesive narrative, but what the heck? We won't remember anything in two weeks anyhow. Not exactly true: I do remember that this huge park covers 3,350 square kilometers, which translates into roughly 830,00 acres, split 65% / 35% between ocean and landmass. Among various claims to fame, the reserve is home to the only red beach in the Americas (and one of only five in the world) thanks to an igneous rock called granodiorite. And if you're into birding, you can find up to 200 different species here throughout the year. So, there you go.

We had a chance to get out of the bus in three spots to take the obligatory selfies and listen to the wind and the waves. I am glad that I had a chance to see this UNESCO-protected reserve on two occasions during this trip. If you ever find yourself down in these parts, make sure to plan for a visit.

And that concludes my account of the first four-and-a-half days of my current trip to Peru. Yes, just a bit more than 125 hours, and so many impressions! By now I have left Paracas, but that part of the journey will be covered in the next installment, when time and internet connection permit. Thanks for reading!

Jürgen