Lima, the Larco Museum, and Home

We arrived late to our hotel, the Casa Bella Boutique Hotel in Miraflores neighborhood. We were beat. We slept in, and had breakfast with a couple from Guelph, Ontario. They were surprised that Sandi knew their town. They had missed their flight, as the flight time had changed without them being notified. We and they decided to pay for an additional night to allow ourselves a place to rest before our late flight back to the USA. We changed to the Hotel Faro nearby. We went to the Cathedral on the main plaza, which was closed as part of a ceremony to had over new fire trucks and ambulances to the firemen. The Cathedral was somewhat interesting, really a museum. We liked better the working church of Santo Domingo, where we saw petitions that people had put into the glass boxes that held statues, a kind of mailbox to God. Unfortunately, we ran out of time to see the museum in Santo Domingo. We took a taxi back to the hotel, and rested some. We then took a taxi to the Museo Larco, which was quite wonderful.

The beautiful grounds of the Larco

The Museo Larco is a private museum, a collection of an anthropologist and his wealthy father. The artifacts were of high artistic quality, and the explanatory text was on the big picture, rather than giving us detailed information about each artifact. Rather than focus on the well known Inka culture, it covered many of the cultures that preceded that Inka, such as the Moche, Nazca, and Pucara. We got a sense of the common elements of the native religions. The textiles and metal work were especially impressive. This was an excellent museum, with beautiful grounds. We had a snack in their restaurant, and then headed back to the hotel.

Hilary picked us up at the hotel, and took us to the airport. Our flight left Lima at 1 AM. The flight to Atlanta was routine; we arrived at about 8 AM, and headed for the Delta Club to await our flight to Denver.