It’s starting to feel like all I do in Peru is course readings and weekend vacations (which doesn’t seem like such a bad life to me). This weekend there was a holiday on Friday, so my host family used the long weekend to take a trip! They were so nice to invite me along and we went to San Ramon, a town on the edge of the jungle a 7 hour drive away from Lima. What was really cool about the drive was that we passed through the highlands of Peru to get to the San Ramon, so I got to see two different climates on the trip. The drive was incredibly beautiful, with mountains and glistening bodies of water. There was also a little snow in the highlands, which was much more exciting for those who hadn’t spent their whole lives in New England. My host family was fascinated by my life in cold weather and were amazed by how cold it got in the winter in Maine. On our drive back it started to snow a bit and my family was quite excited. It was fun to watch them enjoy snow so much. My host sister told me that is was the first time she had ever seen snow falling.
At the highest train bridge in the world and the highest point you can drive to in Peru.
Once we got to the hotel it was warm and sunny (yay!) and we spent lots of time during the weekend sitting near the pool talking. It was really nice to get to spend a whole weekend with my host family, since I often don’t get to talk to them a lot during the week because we are all so busy. I also spent a ton of time doing readings for my classes (I am mighty slow at reading in Spanish), but reading is a lot more enjoyable when sitting outside in the warm weather.
The pool at our hotel, surrounded by plants that covered the entire grounds of the hotel.
I went with my host siblings and my host brother’s girlfriend to a market to buy local fruit. We ate a ton of delicious fruit I had never tried before. And I’m counting this as my picture of food from the trip.
The view from one of the restaurants where we ate lunch. I think this weekend I ate about 12 bananas in the form of fried bananas and banana chips.
On Saturday, we went to a nearby waterfall. To get to the waterfall, we did a quasi-hike on a path that was surrounded by big green plants, a stream with some smaller waterfalls, and tons of butterflies. We even stopped and swam in a spot of the stream with a little waterfall. On our walk we met a five-year-old boy, Angel, whose mom worked at a booth selling food along the path. Angel walked with us all the way to the waterfall and back, acting as our tiny guide. Whenever he feel behind the first person in our group, he would run ahead to make sure that he was in the front. It was super adorable.
At the waterfall with my host sister.
A snapshot of our walk.
There was a little carnival that we passed by in the center of San Ramon (also, note the beauteous mountains in the background).
A town we stopped at quickly on our ride home. I mean, is this real life?
On an unrelated note, tomorrow I am going to visit one of the nonprofits that I will be working with this semester. I’m really excited to get started with that and get a fuller picture of Lima beyond my neighborhood and university. Yippeee!
Lima Living 
thank you for posting a food picture, even its inclusion was for the sole purpose of appeasing your readership
so glad you were able to spend some time with your host family- this weekend getaway looks absolutely beautiful. you look so happy as a native liman (is that what they’re called??)- cant wait to read your next post about your nonprofit! xo