Easter Sunday in Peru

Even the Easter bunny visits Peru :)

So today was quite the busy day. We did lots of touristy things (visited an inquisition museum, toured a monastery, the President's house, shopped at a local market, ate lunch at a FABULOUS restaurant, took a bus tour, took a zumba class, and now am crashing. This blog takes a while to upload and won't let me move pictures around once they are uploaded (which I didn't know until I had already uploaded them all). They are in a crazy order but you will get an idea of what an awesome day we had. Tomorrow we will head out to Independencia for our service work. We won't be able to upload the blog until Tuesday night so hopefully the amount of pictures here will hold you over!

 All the loot the kids got at the market.

 DELICIOUS buffet lunch.

  A fun game of ninja in the hotel lobby.

 Will won MVP for Saturday because of the way he connected with a little boy at the orphanage. Boom.

 1, 2, 3...Narcolepsy. Yes, we are crazy Americans :)

 The buffet had sushi and the girls were in heaven.

 Inca cola is the yellow liquid in Lee's glass. It tastes like bubblegum. So bizarre!

 So. Much. Food!

 The Easter bunny came and visited us at lunch!

 The group after our Zumba class

 Group shot after the tour of the monastery.

 Shake it! Thanks to Ernesto for leading our awesome zumba class!

Most hilarious moment ever. Lunch was such an amazing time for us all.

Bienvenidos Peru!

Well we made it here safe and sound! Our plane arrived around 10:30pm Peru time (11:30pm Raleigh time) and went through customs without a hitch. We quickly collected our baggage and headed to the Y. Everyone was pretty pooped so after a quick debrief we fell fast asleep.

Laddie and her crew welcomed us with a lovely breakfast and slideshow to share what we could expect during the week. We could already tell the group was group was bonding because of all the laughter and jokes made at breakfast.

 Since we are such a big group we travel on a big bus. Obviously we have a good time wherever we go!

 Our first service project was to work at an orphanage with special needs children. Our teens split into three teams and went into different rooms (boys, girls, and babies). While we were there we took them on walks in their wheelchairs, played ball, fed them lunch, and just gave them some one-on-one attention.

 After lunch we visited another orphanage. This one. had neuro-typical children. We played games, sang songs, and played with donated bubbles and jump ropes.  This is the only picture from this orphanage because we weren't allowed to take any pictures inside.

After dinner we went to a water park in downtown Lima. This isn't like Emerald Pointe water park, but more beautiful fountains. Most of the fountains are for looking but one is for playing.

Tomorrow we are off to Miraflores (a "borough" of Lima) for a tour off the catacombs, to see the changing of the guards at the President's house, and to take a double-decker bus tour of the city. More pictures and adventures to share soon :)

Listos para Peru?

That means "Are you ready for Peru?" in Spanish!

So are you? Are you ready for Peru?

On Friday, we leave for our trip to Lima, Peru. My biggest struggle was packing well. But, I think I packed well. My friend gave me a great tip: pack each outfit into a gallon sized ziplock baggie so that, when you are in close quarters with a lot of traveling friends, you can grab and go out of your suitcase. Other benefits of this packing methodology: keeps clean things away from dirty things, and saves lots of space in your suitcase.

So if you're not ready, there's a great tip. I'm excited to spend a week south of the equator with 18 all star high schoolers. I know that big things are going to happen, and I am thankful to be along for the ride!

See you at the airport on Friday!

-Liz Simpers (one of the lucky adults that gets to go to Peru)