Breathtaking Cocktail Hour Views

Here is what we saw from our veranda on the evening of our first day at sea after going through the Canal and enroute to Key West.

Panama Canal Transit

In 2003 we made our first transit through the Panama Canal.  During this, our second transit, the Canal is being widened.  We have just learned that the controversy over cost overruns is being resolved in favor of the contractor, unlike any experience I ever have had with fixed price contracts.  Ok, coworkers, let's deal with the Panama Canal Commission henceforth.

Viewing still pictures really doesn't give one a very good idea of what it's like to go through the Canal.  I made a halting attempt to film the experience but am having trouble loading the film to this blog, so I will have to deal with that issue when I get home and have time to fiddle without being charged an arm and a leg for the internet time.  In the meantime... 

Watching a ship entering the Miraflores Lock.
We were next in line on the right side of the paved passgeway.

Miraflores Lock House

I also include some still pictures of scenes along the passage route that give you an idea of the challenges posed by the terrain that had to be managed to build the canal. Workers cleared brush to enable passage across the isthmus between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.  They terraced land along the Canal route to enable workers to build the lakes and locks.

Brush by the side of the Panama Canal

Terraced Grades Along the Panama Canal

The lakes and waterways of the Canal are really lovely.   Our weather along the eight-hour trip was variable.  Usually it was cloudy.

International Bridge over Panama Canal

By the time we left the Canal, the skies were darkening.  The Caribbean Sea greeted us in a serene and stately manner.

Manta, Ecuador

We made a quick trip into Manta, known locally as the Fish City because of its abundance of tuna and other ocean fish.  

Piscean Greeting at Entrance to Mantua, Fish City

The weather had begun to get muggy for the first time since we left Santiago.  Manta is a beach town, and we were able to see one of its six beaches from our veranda while at port. 

Manta, Ecuador  

We enjoyed an hour or so of shopping in the town square, where vendors from all over the country had come to entice us with their goods. 

Clothing Vendor at Manta Market

The best buy in the area is Panama hats.  Despite their name, these hats traditionally are made in Ecuador.  They can be very intricately woven, and some are valued at thousands of dollars.  They are lightweight and can be folded and easily packed. The women's hats have larger brims than do the men's hats.

Senor Karsten in Panama Hat

Senora Karsten in Panama Ha

Many vendors sold silver jewelry, much of it featuring turquoise, lapis, mother of pearl, and jade of poor quality.  Some clothing was made of lightweight cotton; other wearables were woven of heavy cotton.  The workmanship was really substandard--very inadequate seams and hems.  I figured that a blouse would possibly make it through two or three washings in a machine before falling apart.  The best buy seemed to be vicuna shawls, although the vicuna was not processed to a fine standard.  If you like big fat yellow brown cowboy belts, I apologize for not having bought you one.  Ditto, if you are into indigenous musical wind instruments.

Although we bought little, we did enjoy our little venture into Ecuador.  The people were very friendly and welcoming at the port and in town.  The country is trying to promote tourism in a big way, and representatives greet you as soon as you leave the last step of the gangway.  They gave us a travel tote, maps, and bookmarks.  But they have a way to go, as evidenced by our experience at the tourism tent.  For $2 US (and by the way, US currency is the Ecuadorian currency as well) they were selling postcards stamped and ready for mailing anywhere in the world.  We were all set to buy and mail to our philatelist friends when we noticed that not one of the dozens of cards they were selling had a picture of Manta.  Since we do not like to send postcards of things we have not seen, we took a pass.

Travel Advisory for Skeeter Hirose

Cuy, a Peruvian delicacy, is roasted guinea pig.  According to my research (prompted by a question at our daily Trivia match), guinea pigs are a traditional "good luck" food in Peru.  Guinea pig reportedly is being touted as an alternative to beef throughout South America because of its lower carbon footprint and similar nutritional value.  Guinea pig is a particularly popular food in Peru, Ecuador and Guatemala.

Skeeter, stay home.

Lima and Trujillo, Peru

Lima

On Sunday, March 2, we spent a pleasant afternoon touring Lima, the capital of Peru and of colonial America as well.  The buildings in the town square are modeled on those of France.  Most of our tour was narrated by a "historian."  He was a very nice older man who told us that he loved his three years of living in the U.S. and working at the Stardust Hotel in the early '70s.  That must have taken place before he became a historian!

We began our visit by touring the absolutely stunning St. Peter's Church. We could not use flash but were allowed to take pictures while the service was taking place.  As you can see from the photos below, all sorts of decorative arts were applied to the interior.  The shine you see in some of these pictures is actually gold leaf applied very thickly.

St. Peter's Cathedral Alter

Tile Decoration at St. Peter's

Chandelier and Ceiling at St. Peter's

Next, we visited San Marcos University, the alma mater of the historian and the oldest university in the Americas.  This university was chartered in 1551 by the Holy Roman Emperor.  Navigating the original campus, a walled compound comprising many corridors, buildings, and open courtyards, reminded both Dave and me of touring the Alhambra.

San Marcos University Courtyard

San Martin Square, which is bordered by the presidential palace and the Cathedral of Lima, was our next stop.  The Cathedral, a museum today, is reportedly spectacular.  Alas,  it was closed on Sunday.  It was fun to walk around the square, which was filled with people who seemed to be enjoying the sights, the sounds of a lively band on a side street, and a conga type of dance led by a person who was dressed as a clown.  Our guide said that Peruvians are mandated to work Monday-Saturday and that many work 14- to 16-hour days.  Sunday is family day and shopping day. 

San Martin Square, Lima

Dancing in the Streets Near St. Martin Square

One of the most interesting things about Lima is that it is known for having houses with balconies. This government building has some especially pretty ones.

Colonial House in Lima

A real treat was in store for us when we visited a Lima mansion.  It has been occupied by the same family that built it in 1551. The matriarch of the family is 102 years old and in good health.  The original owner of the house was Pizarro's chief of the exchequer.  The family wealth comes from trading.

Interior Mill Work

Parlor

Dining Room

Bed Chamber

Atrium from Balcony Above

On our way out of town and back to the ship, which was docked in nearby Callao, we passed by the huaca shown in the following picture.  The dig for the rest of this ancient area is ongoing.

Huaca in Lima

Since the 19th century, there has been a huge influx of Chinese and Japanese people to this country.  They have assimilated with the indigenous population, so they now are brown people with some Asian facial features.  The tour guide and the historian told us many times that Peruvians love "chita," their name for Chinese food.  They said it is cheap and filling.

Trujillo, Peru

Trujillo is the second largest city in Peru and the gateway to sites with renowned pre Columbian ruins.  Neither Dave nor I was in the mood for ruins, so we took a round trip on the shuttle bus from the ship to Trujillo and back. Several shipmates said that that the town square was fun because there was a great band and much merriment to celebrate Fat Tuesday.   

Trujillo Town Square

Our ship was docked in the smelliest port we ever have encountered:  Salaverry.  Thus, we spent our time there in olfactory purgatory, enveloped by the sulphur-like smell of dredging results each time someone aboard ship opened a door to the outside.  Definitely not a day for reading on the balcony!

Dredging at Salaverry

The silver lining was that we were able to observe creatures who enjoyed the dredging more than we did:  brown pelicans.  We have seen many brown pelicans on this trip, and we love pelicans.  At Salaverry, they congregated to jockey for position on the dredging machine with time off to feast on fish or take a swim.  

Pelicans Waiting for Fruits of Dredging

Surveying the Scene from a Rock Perch

A Postscript

You know we Karstens like our order and cleanliness.  Well, for that reason, Peru is not for us.  It was very dispiriting to note the trash that was strewn everywhere we went.  It was on the countryside roads, on the city streets, and even stashed behind lovely grillwork at houses in the towns we visited.  We have rarely seen such disregard for the common areas, and it saddened us.  I debated about whether to write about this, but I decided that I should mention it because it was as much a fact as were the haunting beauty of the land and the gorgeous treasures of the cities.    

Matarani and Pisco, Peru

We really didn't know what to expect in southern Peru.   We opted for viewing, rather than touring sights. What we found was some spectacular scenery!    

Port at Matarani, Peru

Sunset over Pacific Ocean near Matarani, Peru

Paracas Bay and Environs, Peru

Near San Martin, Peru

Near San Martin, Peru

From our ship, we observed the constant to and fro of trucks dumping a substance that looked like sand that will soon be processed to become salt for the roads and exported to Canada and the U.S.  We enjoyed puttering around the craft booths at port, where my favorite sight was this adorable chess set with an Incan theme.

Chile and the Atacama Desert

 

 

 

Well, it's day 7 of our cruise, and I am posting for the first time.  We have been having a fabulous time aboard the Silver Spirit, but it has not been the stuff of blogging.  The biggest news until recently was that we won the first bridge tournament of the cruise and joined a very fun Trivia Team comprising friends from Great Britain, South Africa, Brooklyn/Miami, and San Francisco.  We have enjoyed reconnecting with friends, Jill and Michael, from Bristol, GB.  We had such fun with them on our trip to Australia and New Zealand, and we have picked up just where we left off.  Now to the travelogue. 

Arica, Chile

We were in Arica on Wednesday, February 26.  We  had a great view from our room veranda of the port's official greeter, and of El Morro, the site of the decisive battle between Peru and Chile in the War of the Pacific.

Port Greeter at Arica, Chile

El Morro at Arica, Chile

Atacama Desert

On the afternoon of February 26, we realized a long-held dream:  touring the Atacama Desert. Our conveyance for the journey could not be described as drab.

Our Bus for Atacama Tour

We drove east for several hours of viewing the world's driest dry desert.  The scenery is varied---not much of the flat, sandy land I expected, but lots of hills and mountains, valleys, and pink, red and white nitrate veins in rock walls.. We learned that Chile's main export was once nitrates, particularly saltpeter.  We saw saltpeter--which looked like black rocks--from the bus as we whizzed along on a beautifully paved road.  The Atacama Desert is said to be littered with now dead but once thriving nitrate-producing towns, but we did not see them.  Today, NOAA uses this desert as a test site for its Mars experiments.

We only saw a sliver of the 41,000-square mile desert.  The desert temperatures varied from 30 C (about 86 F) at the start of our trip at 3 p.m. to 19 (about 68 F) at 8:15 p.m. or so when we left the desert.   

Valley of the Moon, Atacama Desert

Atapucha (road markers) near Valley of the Moon, Atacama Desert

Atacama Desert near Cobda

My favorite spot in the desert was where we viewed a series of statues by Chilean artist, Juan Diaz Fleming.  The sculptures are a paean to the Amazon people who created a unique Chilean culture, despite the barriers posed by desert and mountain geography.

Church, Woman, Man

Uterus

Codpa

Midway through our 6-hour exploration, the village of Codpa appeared in a valley below a particularly steep turn in the road.

Cobda

As you can see, Codpa has some green in its landscape because it is located in a fertile (but narrow) valley.  Its 100 or so full-time inhabitants include farmers who grow produce for other towns in the Atacama.  We were treated to local delicacies--pintatani (the very worst red wine either Dave or I ever have tasted, quinoa, and dried guava.  This town, a traditional place of rest for Arica, is being promoted as a tourist destination.  There are petroglyphs from ancient people on nearby rocks, a church built by the Spaniards during colonization, and a one-room museum with the only public bathrooms in town. I will remember Cobda for  the charming mural painted by a member of Chile's voluntary national service corps of young people who have graduated from college in the past year, a beautiful stone wall, and a darling dog who followed us everywhere and never begged for a handout.  

Codpa Building Wall Decorated by National Service Student

Stone Wall in Codpa, Chile

Codpa dog