We landed in Lima in the early afternoon. We’ve adopted a new luxury strategy for airline arrivals now - the pre-booked airport transfer. I can tell you that it is a luxury we now cannot do without. We haven’t gone completely soft as we did tackle the public transport system in Lima, but more on that later.
Our taxi from the airport left us less than inspired by Lima. Even as we left the dreary suburbs around the airport, much like those around any airport in the world, and turned on to the ‘Esplanade’ it only seemed to get worse. Lima itself has abandoned this coastal road and perched itself on what looks like a steep mound of dried mud held together by frayed netting. It seems impossible that the whole lot doesn’t just slide down into the sea. The sea itself, lapping up against the road is covered with what looks like a filthy foam.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt so happy about turning off a shore road. Our hotel was in the financial district, pleasant enough, but nothing authentically peruvian.
We googled and found that the ‘Centro Histórico de Lima’ was 47 minutes away by bus. That sounded like what we were after. Some research about public transport revealed that you buy a transit card for the bus which costs less than a pound, but then you have to top it up. Could we find a place to buy a card? We ‘Translated’ someone at the bus stop: ‘Can we pay cash for the bus?’ We got an incredulous reply that we took to mean ‘Of Course!’.
It took ages for a 266 to come along and when it did we hopped aboard and proffered 10 Soles. The driver barked something and indicated backwards. At first we took it to mean get on board, but access was blocked by a turnstile that could only be activated by a prepaid card, so I revised my translation to ‘Away to a shop and buy a card’.
As we slunk by the back door another passenger vigorously waved us in. We tentatively obeyed, but as we looked towards the front the driver was barking something incomprehensible and a woman behind was joining in. We went to scurry off again, but our previous host at the back now gestured towards the front were I now went and offered the driver my ten soles. He stuffed the ten in his pocket and started to drive off. I hesitated expecting some change, but as the driver seemed to be just driving I turned to go back to join Vanessa. Another passanger made a gesture that suggested I should wait where I was. After some time, sure enough the driver fumbled around and produced my change.
After this we saw that many passengers (easily half) were in exactly the same position as us with no card, but they already knew the solution. They also knew to just sit and wait until the driver proffered their change. On another bus the driver just lent them a prepaid card (he obviously kept topped up) in exchange for the fare, obviating the need for the back door.
For whatever reason, this prepaid card system appeared not to have been an overwhelming success in Lima. Purely through the resourcefulness of the drivers and their workarounds things still worked.
The ‘Centro Histórico de Lima’ was indeed fascinating.
