Provisioning in Peru and The Coffee Question

Did you know that Peru produces 2.7 million bags of coffee per year?  Coffee should be dripping off of eaves like icicles. This morning, like so many other Peruvian mornings, I had instant coffee. Except for once at Starbucks in Lima and another time at a proper coffee shop in Aguas Calientes it has been instant coffee. The coffee this morning wasn’t even Peruvian! It was Ecuadorian coffee processed in the Dominican Republic and then imported to Peru. That is not the small carbon footprint plan. We actually buy some fair traded Peruvian coffee through Café Britt in Costa Rica. It would be like only finding instant apple sauce powder in Washington that was processed in Canada, then imported back to the US.  

We travelled to Chiclayo this morning from Trujillo. It took about 3.5 hours and no cushy tourist bus this time. We took the regular old local bus with skinny seats. It’s a good thing we are both losing weight or it could have been much worse. As it was, the trip went by pretty quickly and we arrived to a little bit of drizzle in Chiclayo – that’s right – rain! We were actually missing the stuff.

We finally gave in and ate the Peruvian favorite – Chinese food.  I know what you’re thinking, but they love their Chifas here in Peru. It was good, but I think once will be enough. We have been seeking our fresh fruit like machines as we reach each new place. The tangerines here are great and Pam has a new love – the bananita. It is a third scale banana that I have to admit are pretty good. Our other regular searches are for vino, bread sticks, and the bagged popcorn we mentioned before. We have now officially given up on finding good dark chocolate here. Everything has too much sugar and isn’t dark enough.

Tomorrow we go for an all day tour of Sipan temples and museums. It should be fun and there ought to be some pictures to share. Friday morning we take our last Peru only bus ride to Piura which is where we will finally catch our bus to Ecuador on Saturday. It seems a little unbelievable that we are into our fourth week now and nearly done with the Peru part of the adventure. I know at least I am missing our knucklehead dog who has likely given up on our return and turned her attentions to turning Pam’s dad over to her side. He probably has her all trained up so we can wreck all his work on our return.

More tomorrow……