Sitting in the lima airport waiting for our overnight flight back to newark after an amazing 2 weeks (for me) 1 week for her) trip to Peru. Today we celibrated our 28th anniversary by hanging out together and checkign out Lima a little bit more… We were on our way down to the historic old town by taxi when Diane realized it was 3pm .. The exact time we got married on this day in 1986. I grabbed this pic as we tried to repeat our quirky home made vows..

I feel really blessed to have found such a wonderful partner. Our lives together have been full and fun. I love you Diane..!

Nite all, note sam

-me

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Usually 'malo' meansbad or badly in spanish.. But today it was very good. 23 arrived early in Lima from Cusco then spent the day in Malo Perus with our friends and warm hosts Carlos and Gabbi.

Malo is about an hour south of Lima near the Pacific beach. We had a great time talking and checking outt he scenery o n the way down. We g ot to see the magical 'water sign' . It uses electricity to condense moisture out of the humid air to make pure water for this desert area. Anyone can come up and take some. Seriously. It really never rains here.. But the air is always wet.. Go figure….

Soon after the sign, we drove up to Carlos and Gabbi's. They have a lovely ranch with three horses , a donkey, chickens,cats and dogs,,

This is also where carlso grows the grapes for his pisco operation.. Check out his stash of homemade pisco.. All quebranta grapes gwon on his land. 42% gav.. Wonderful stuff.. Gives me soemthign to aspire to with my own moonshine opearation !

Here are the grape vines that will produce this years batch

We would sample some later.. But first a short horse ride. Carlos insited that i wwear real peruvian headware to keep my gringo head from burning off in the near equatorial sun.

Then it was out to see the horses.. First we played with their 1 year old

Then Carlos and his freind set up Asia, for me to ride.. And carlos and i took off

I enjoyed riding Asia.. She knew i had no idea what i was doing, and didnt car.e

.. Carlos and i rode out a ways then met up with a group of his horrse friends : patti, pattis daughter, edger, jose. Luise, and marielle .. They followed us back to Carlos and gabis for more pisco tasting !

Then all the freinds rode off.. Only to call us an hour or so later to tell us they were going out for chifa (peruvian chniese food).. In Malo So we met them there…

From there we were invited. To go to Jose Luis and Mrielle's to sample. Their Coca flavored Pisco.. Who could say know to that ?!

Heres the pisco with coca..

And heres some powdered coca that the family uses for various medicinal purposes.

It was so nice hanging out with these two wonderful families..

By then it was 6!and we had to head back up to lika.. First a quick trip to the beach to stick my feet in the pacific

Then another fun hour drive back in.. A quick stop at carlos and gabbos.. For a tast of chcha.. The purple drink made from corn and pineapple rinds..

Then a quick stop at the hotel for us to change.. And then to Honzo, a great peruvian sushi fusion place .

There we met up,with my freinds rick, jessica and daniel for an amazing japonese peruvian (or was it peruvian japonese) dinner ..

Then it was time to go.. We said good bye to all of our freinds .. And headed in to the hotel.. Diane and i are now sitting in the lobby as i try to post this..

Tomorrow is our 28th anniversary..so happy to be spending it together with my love here in peru…

More tomorrow

Nite all, nite sam

-me

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Ok.. In going to try and post this..bandwidth has made it tough to blog

We gave really enjoyed our stay in cusco.. Tomorrow back to Lima

Nite all, nite sam

-me

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This city is really growing onme. When we first arrived i didnt knwow hat to make of the traffic and noise. Its a big city with lots of cars and very small streets. As we explored more of it today i really began to see mpre of its charm. I do have to say that all the folks trying to sell you things..and all the tourist kitch stores are hard to take, the architecture and scenery make up for it.

Our first order of business today was to get out of town. After a quick breakfast that included coca jelly

Our freind Lenin met us at the hotel at 9 am and we headed south out of town..first stop was the sweet litle town of Anduahayuillas. It has a church that has been called the 'cistine chapel of the americas'. We wernt allowed to take pictures inside, but it was incredible. Everythign was guilded… And there were soem mamazing frescos.. The church dates from the 16th century and is built on an old Inca foundation, musch of the building and artwork has been rebuilt recently

Next stop was piklaqti, a pre inca ruin from the wari people. It dated from the 1100's.. It was huge.. And we were the only visitors there for most of our visit. The workmanship was very differnt from the incas,but amazing in its own right.

On the way to our next stop, Tipon, Lenin stopped at his favorite bakery to get bread for us..and for his mom.. Its a really differnt sort of bread cooked in wood fired ovens and made with anise and cinnamon… It was very good

Our final stop with Leninwas Tipon anamazing Inca structure known for its water works. The whole site was criss crossed with water channels, most of them working

Then it was time to go back to cusco . It was time to say good bye to Lenin. Which was pretty hard to do.. In the short time we had known him we really got to be friends.. Which was amazing since my spanish is so terrible. We still managed to talk abotu everythign we saw.. And moved on to life,philosophy, politcsadn family.. The foundations for any good frinedship. Such a good guy. Someday we would liek to bring the kids back here.. If that works out, it would be great to recinnect with Lenin again!

Next order of business was to go and was all ov our dirty clothes. We put on our last set of clean clothes, and took the restto a local laundrymat. While they were grtting de-disgusted, we went out to explore more of cusco.. It really has some nice sights..

Then We walked around. Town some more

Last stop was the museum of Pisco.. The national drink of peru. Its a distilled spirit from grapes..and very nice. There , sergio, the Piscoterra gave us a sampling of five differnt types of pisco.. From nonaromatic andaromatic grapes, blended, and incompletly fermented.. Each had its own character and taste.. The pis de resistancw as a 45% gav made fromaramotic torontala grapes. It was superb. sergio was so full of unfo.. Some of you might knowthat ive recently taken to …uh… Making … Uh spirits(moonshine) .. So the lesson in distilling was very helpful…it was great to talk to someone about heads, bodys, tales, esters, aldehydes.. And drink wonderful spirts as we did so.

From there we went and picked upour sweet smelling laundry..

We skyped home to talk to hannah and brit (and the dogs..who we are missing)

Dogs are not the best skypers

Then went out to a great dinner at Casa Del heidi ..great food !

Ok.. All for now..lets see if this will upload.

More tomorrow.

Nite all, nite sam

-me

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