Today is a long driving day. We pack up the truck and are off before 8 AM. We are heading south towards Lima, the capital of Peru. We drive along the coast in the coastal desert that stretches down the entire west coast of Peru. It is very dry and arid.
We stop for lunch on the side of the road, right near the ocean. While lunch is being prepared, we walk to and along the cliffs that line the water's edge. It is a beautiful spot. We also noticed that the dunes here are two different colors - white on one side and red on the other. Different types of sand must be blown from different parts as the wind changes direction (we had the same effect in the Namib Desert on our Trans-Africa).
The way continues along the coastal road, which is often clinging to the cliff face that plunges down into the sea. It is a great drive. We arrive in Lima at 6 PM and check into our hotel. After dropping off our bags, some of us go for a wander down to the main square. It is a great city with wonderful buildings that have been well preserved. The effect at night is fantastic, with the buildings well lit up by flood lights. We go check out the main post office, and find that it is open. We decide to check to see if we have any mail, and we are pleased to find 3 cards from Lars' parents and brother (many thanks - greatly appreciated).
We return to the hotel to wash up and get ready for our night out on the town. It has been decided that we will have a boy's and girl's night out (i.e., the boys and girls split up and go their own ways). The boys head to a brauhaus where they can get lots of beer. We order it by the liter and while having some food we play some pool and darts. The dart game got a bit contentious and it was good that it soon finished. Much was at stake - if you got points against you, you had to drink lots of beer. Suffice it to say that lots of points were scored against all players, so lots of beer was drunk. The waitresses had to keep going and getting us more. In the end, we had about 40 liters of beer.
At this point, the brauhaus was shutting down, so off we trotted into the city streets to go and try to meet up with the girls. A meeting point had been arranged at a dodgy disco near the hotel. It is a good thing that the streets were devoid of most traffic as we needed the whole street to stagger along on our way to the meeting point.
At the disco, we persuaded them to waive the cover charge and we slipped down some dimly lit steps to a subterranean chamber that passed for a disco. After a bit of wandering around in the dark place, we found the girls hidden away in the back corner. While they seemed to have had fun over dinner, they did not seem to have consumed as much of the evil drink.
We were delighted to find out that the disco gave you for free your first drink if you signed their guest book - we were very happy to do that and we enjoyed the drink on the house. Things started to get a bit more crazy after this. For better (for those that got a bit crazy) or worse (it would have been lots of fun for the website), we did not have our camera with us, so there is no photographic proof of what went on.
People were dancing up a storm on the dance floor, both with others from the group and with the locals. The locals seemed fascinated by us. There was at least one member of the group that got very intimate with one of the local ladies. Then there was the member of the group that attacked and bit one of the others. Names will not be used to protect the innocent. Some of us found our way to the exit via the dark stairs just before 3 AM - not sure when the rest made it back to the hotel.