After some close to on-time flights, mass confusion at the Mexico City airport customs/immigration area, and just a little bit of sleep we arrived in Lima around 7am to be greeted by....no one! I was worried I had booked us some fake tour by some fake tour group, but no. All was good. They just had some sort of mix up. We took a taxi to the hotel and they will reimburse us for that. All good.
Hotel Dazzler was very nice. After we freshened up a bit, they stored our luggage and we were off to explore the city. Mission 1: breakfast at Cafe de la Paz. However, on the way we found what I will call Parque de gatos. Holy fright! I've never seen so many cats in one place! Cats in the trees. Cats on benches. Cats in flowers. So many cats! Amazing!
We had some light breakfast of fruit and some sort of cake. Just a light start to our day of food! Then we checked out the Inca Markets. Many treasures, but nothing we needed. We then took a nice stroll along the coastline to lunch. The coastline is beautiful full of great sculpture and amazing views. We loved it!!
We arrived at La Mar for lunch just before they opened. We loved the interior of this place! Great colors/space! We got some yummy free appetizers. Then, Michael tried his first pisco sour and I had some other cocktail wit pisco. Then, we had a ceviche sampler that was amazing! We also had a mystery dish after. I thought it was going to be potatoes, but it was potatoes, carne asada type meat on a stick and hominy on the cob. Good, but we really only needed the ceviche.
After our yummy lunch it was off to Choco Museo for our 2 hour bean to bar workshop. We started with the beans, roasted them, ground them and made 2 types of hot chocolate and a lovely tea from the shells of the beans. Great fun! Then we got to make our own chocolates using their chocolate that had been further processed into liquid. It was a long 2 hours when we were already pretty tired, but I think it was worth it to see the process.
Then it was nap time! We had a lovely nap! And so needed it! Then it was off to dinner at fancy Maido, one of the top 50 restaurants in the world and number 2 in Lima. Getting a reservation at the number 1 restaurant was practically impossible, but we were very happy with our experience at Maido. We did the 16-course tasting menu and loved it! It want just about the food, but the vessels on which it arrived! So fun! It was a 2.5 hour ordeal and we both enjoyed it. Our faves were the steam bun fish sandwich, the pigeon sushi (so yummy!) and the fried ribeye cheese ball. The guinea pig was even tasty!! The only not-so-good dish was the sea urchin. Ick!!
It was a great day full of adventure. Michael described it as the best complete day of food he's ever had. Boom!
We're off to Cusco today. Hopefully more to come tonight. Including more pics from our camera cameras. :)
