Huanchaco

This weekend was another infamous holiday in Peru, so a few friends and I decided to hit the north of the country and head to Trujillo and Huanchaco, cities on the beach about 13 hours (by bus) north of Lima.

The hostel's pet turtle

The Crew :)

Fanny, Dan Karlin, Dan Pastorius, Josh and I grabbed tickets on a comfy overnight bus, packed our bags, and got psyched for a few days of awesome Peruvian seafood, surfing and ruins. We decided to stay in a hostel right on the beach. We had big plans to visit ruins, see the city of Trujillo, and enjoy some Peruvian culture.

Fanny being serenaded

We arrived at the beach early in the morning after a LONG bus ride up the coast of Peru. Our hostel was awesome, it was two buildings, the first with a huge courtyard full of hammocks, complete with a resident tortoise :) We dumped our bags and went to find breakfast. The town was compact and fun - tons of restaurants and bars and cute shops full of touristy jewelry.

Caballitos de totora

We decided that we wanted to take some surfing lessons in the afternoon, so we found a little shop with some enthusiastic teachers, and headed back to the hostel to get our suits.  We showed up for the lesson and were led to the "other store" where they had all the wetsuits and boards...which was clearly just a crash pad for 20-something Peruvian surf bums. But we suited up in our mismatched wetsuits, booties with holes in the toes, and huge foam boards and headed out to the waves.

Sunset

On the beach, the "instructors" gave us a brief lesson on land (paddle, jump, pray!) and before we knew it we were out in the waves. The water wasn't as freezing as it was in Lima, and we had a fun hour or so being pushed into the waves by the instructors. But our foam boards were soon waterlogged and heavy, and my girly arms got pretty tired, so we didn't last very long after our teachers floated off at the end of the allotted lesson time. But it was so warm and sunny, and the water was great, and we sat on the beach and watched the men fish and surf in their traditional reed boats (caballitos de totora or "little reed horsies" :). 

Jammin' Josh

Street food!

We watched the amazing sunset, ate some fantastic ceviche, and lounged in the hammocks of our hostel drinking the local beers. We caught wind of a "Reggae Party" happening at one of the (only) bars in town, so once it was late enough, Josh, Pastorius and I headed out to see what a Peruvian beach reggae party would be like.

We severely underestimated how late the "party" would begin, and ended up being some of the first people to show up at the bar...but we had fun and eventually the party picked up speed.

But the band was pretty bad, and Josh was complaining that he could totally outdo the guitar player - so at some point when they were taking a break between songs I gushed to the lead singer about how my friend LOVED them so much and would be so psyched if he could play a song with them :) My Spanish flattery and charm being much improved since my early days in Peru, this worked like a charm, and in no time Josh was on stage improv jamming with the band! He rocked it!

Outdoor sleeping...

We got some street food (skewers of mostly unidentifiable meat - but what you could identify, you mostly didn't want to...chicken hearts, anticuchos (beef heart), regular grilled chicken, and random other treats), and headed back to the hostel. But what we didn't realize is that there was a strict curfew and we had been locked out! But the boys came to the rescue and scaled a wall using the vines growing on it as a ladder and made it over the outer wall and into the outdoor courtyard to unlock the door.

Peruvian hairless dog (ew!)

For some reason, we then decided it would be a great idea to sleep in the hammocks in the courtyard...so we grabbed all out pillows and blankets, and "camped" in the hammocks outside our rooms :) 

I was rudely awakened by other tourists giggling at us, and upon further inspection, realized I was the only one left in the hammocks. Apparently the boys got cold and left me swinging in the breeze alone!

Chan Chan

But we had a super relaxing day and did almost nothing but eat, lounge, shop and soak up the chill Peruvian beach vibe. We were all surprisingly totally in love with the little city of Huanchaco, and were having too much fun being tourists but not looking at ruins, museums, art or anything in the guide book!

On our last day, we decided to actually visit Trujillo, the city we originally were aiming to explore. We first stopped off at Chan Chan, which is famous for being the largest adobe city in the ancient world. We paid our money, skipped the high-pressure option for a guide, and wandered through the adobe maze. It was mostly eroded, with only small sections that had been "restored" to anything resembling the intricate patterns our guidebook claimed used to cover the walls of the city.

It didn't take long before we were all slightly bored, and we eventually headed into town for dinner. We had no real goals for sightseeing, so we stuck to the main plaza and a few side streets and found an Italian restaurant.

We ate and reminisced, but eventually we had to catch our overnight bus back to Lima :(

It was a really fun long weekend, and we were all happy and relaxed after all the sunshine, surfing, shopping, ceviche and local beer!