Spring Day of the Dead Waxing Moon of the Southern Cross

Today we entered the Achatama desert, the driest desert in the Americas, perhaps in the world. They simply don’t get rain here. Except during El Nino. Then they flood. The last El Nino event for them was 1998 and the ruins of Tambo Colorado, an adobe palace built for administrators of the Inca Empire of this region still shows rivulets of mud that have dried now thirteen years, the last time rain came to in the Inka Department of Peru.

We docked in General San Martin port, named for the liberator Jose San Martin who landed here on his quest to beat back the Spaniards, contemporaneous with Bolivar in the north. He reportedly woke up one morning in Pisco, saw flamingos rising from a body of water and decided the Peruvian flag should have red white and red. Which it does.

The tour today took us inland through various regions of the Athacama desert, past small towns of the Inka Department, which has only 1% unemployment compared to Lima’s 10% plus 60% subemployment. I asked Yanina, our tour guide, why Inka Department had such a favorable rate and she said the economy has mining, agriculture and fishing plus a bit of manufacturing, a balanced economic mix.

Our destination was Tambo Colorado, the best preserved Inca palace and grounds in the nation. The chaski, the means of passing messages and taxes by runners capable of running 24 K, could move communications more than 250 miles a day. This required secure trails and roads and these administrative centers helped protect the runners and to execute the Imperial affairs like taxes.

Tambo Colorado’s preservation is due to the extreme dryness of the Athacama Desert.

Stretches of the walls still have adobe with pigmentation in yellow and red, a remarkable state. The palace sits on a hill side overlooking the Pisco river valley below with excellent sight lines for defense.

The windows and doors of the palace have a trapezoidal construction which makes them more stable in earthquakes. Like many indigenous structures I have seen in Mexico and other parts of Latin America these withstand the earthquakes triggered by movement of the Nazca Plate while the cathedrals and other Spanish buildings do not.

After this visit, we motored over to the estancia of Peru’s Minister of Agriculture who has 200 hectares under intense cultivation, growing green asparagus, mineola and many varieties of grape. This is Peru’s wine making region and the source of the Pisco wine which Peru considers its national drink.

We had a meal which included small boiled potatoes on toothpicks with a cheese sauce, macadamia nuts grown on the estancia, plantain with cheese, turkey, rice, asparagus, maize and carrots.

The hacienda had a bath house with bougainvillea draped over its white lattice work, yellow loungers next to the blue painted pool and a low, one story adobe house, quite large with airy rooms. We used the family’s facilities while we were there so had a chance to see the inside.

I met the minister’s wife or his eldest daughter and chatted with her for a bit. She said they live in Lima part of the week and at the hacienda for the rest of the time. I asked here if they came down here for the sun. She laughed and said, “Yes.”

It was near here, at the Cerro Colorado, where a Peruvian archaeologist found several mummified remains of Paraccan culture individuals.

Back on board now and pulling away from the dock here in General San Martin port, headed next for Coquimbo, Chile with 2 days at sea before we arrive there.

Spring Beltane Waxing Moon of the Southern Cross

Dinner with Pizarro. Tonight we dined in a residence originally owned by Francisco Pizzaro. It had the family initials in wood over the dining room door. This was an overtop place. Wood carved in many different styles, parquet floors and wooden ceilings. There were cupola’s cut into the ceilings that hat windows and pull cords to close and open. In this dry climate no screens were necessary.

This was dinner with 8 tables of ten people each, 80 of our closest friends from the ship. The candlelight came from small votives on the table, but it was spectacular anyhow.

We had five courses, an asparagus souffle, an entree of beef, sweet potatoes, a large white maize and broccoli. Each course came to us from the left, served by Peruvians in white jackets and white gloves. Our guy looked like the odd man out among a crew of experienced waiters. He grimaced at the task of serving us, trying to make it look right and obviously unsure of himself. I tipped him, probably the only one who tipped a waiter at this meal.

Dessert was a whipped orange affair made from the fruit of a luchma. We got that it was a fruit from a tree but that was as close as we could come. It had a tangy, fruity taste if taken in small bites, in larges ones the sugar overwhelmed it.

Since this is All Saints, the crowded streets were empty of traffic, people at home or lounging outside small businesses, visiting family. Earlier in the day many people went to the cemeteries to spiff up the graves and generally do things I thought went with day of the dead. I have some learning to do here.

Colonial Lima has some wonderful balconied haciendas, often quite opulent, as Pizarro’s old home was. As I sat there, I meditated on the irony of white Americans dining in a Conquistador’s residence, served by indios in Peru.

Driving home the streets had litter on them from celebrations and street side restaurants serving brochettes, or shish-kebab’s introduced from Poland long ago. As Rosa said yesterday, “When you eat in Lima, your are eating history.”

In just over an hour we sail for General San Martin and the city of Pisco, home of the Peruvian national liquor, Pisco, famous for its use in Pisco Sours. Pisco, Lonely Planet says, suffered 80% damage in the 2007 quake, a 7.9. I’m making a foray into the Peruvian countryside tomorrow to a pre-Incan fortress at Tambo Colorado, then dinner at a Peruvian hacienda.

Addenda the next day to the 7.9 quake number. Folks in the Inka Department, apparently supported by international earthquake specialists and folks from the US Geological survey, did a subsequent inspection and determined that this was actually an 8.4 quake. A lot bigger.

The Peruvian government though went with 7.9. It seems that 8.0 is the trigger for national disaster relief and responsibility.