The perfect trip- Belated posting

Me, arqueologist Gaby Freyre, Marta  Nuñez and Charo Dominguez

When ever I go to a new city or country and I know someone who lives there I like to ask them to show me their London, their Barcelona, or their Lima and I do the same when  people visit New York,  For instance when my good friend Martin Ruiz Camino was the Tourism Director for Mexico based in London he first took me to The British Library and the Room of Treasures where I saw the different versions of the Magna Carta, many of the Beatles’ songs, The Tale of Genji plus Dickens, Shakespeare, Chaucer, the Gutenberg Bible plus on and on.  Our next outing was to Greenwich where I learned about Greenwich meantime, longitude and latitude and the National Gallery for me to see the Monets as promised to my mother. It made the trip so much more special.

My dear friend Marta Nuñez is Peruvian and lives in Lima. I had been threatening to visit for years and, when I finally said I truly was going and asked for help in planning my stay in her country, she got into motion.  She planned the perfect trip to her native city. This included getting her good friend, food journalist Maria Elena Cornejo, to lead a tour of the market and provide culinary guidance.  She in turn arranged wonderful meals at Picanteria, La Panchita, Gaston y Astrid, and provided recipes for any dish that I liked. She  wrote a beautiful article on me for Peru’s hottest magazine Caretas. Another friend, best-selling children’s author, Teresina Muñoz-Lara, gave me her series of books on cooking ingredients called Historias Deliciosas to bring to my granddaughter Violeta.  An archeologist friend, Gaby Freyre,  led a private tour to the magnificent Larco Museum with its collection of erotic pottery and breathtaking gardens.

Everything was specially planned and special indeed, particularly the meal that Charo and Pedro organized for us at Don Fernando where I finally had the Peruvian food I thought I would find everywhere but sadly did not.

The Perfect Traveling Companion

Pedro Luis  de Aguinaga and I   have been friends for nearly 30 years.  We’ve celebrated major and minor  birthdays, Christmases, Thanksgiving. and book parties together among any other events.  He is always there for important occasions , helping me plan the menu, decorate the table and anything else that needs to be taken care of for that special party. We speak on the phone for hours very frequently.  Pedro is a great storyteller and most amusing if somewhat cynical and I thoroughly enjoy his company. He and another good friend Victor Nava are two of the most elegant people I have ever known.

We  have traveled to many places together, discovering customs and regional dishes. He  has an interesting approach to travel: Unlike me, he won’t do any prior research preferring to discover the heart and soul of a city or region when we get there. He is also a wonderful photographer and, because of him, I am able  to illustrate my posts.(if interested check out the travel section.) If  we have a guide he always asks the perfect question. Pedro is immensely cultured and well informed and I just sit back and absorb the information. He has an eye not just for the perfect angle and frame  for a photograph but for people and places we will enjoy and things I will want to buy.

The travel agency planned the hit-or-miss outings to Machu Picchu, Cuzco and its fabulous market, Arequipa and I would have never made it without him. It was rough going because of the altitude and cobbled stone roads everywhere that adde alking difficult for me but he was always there to offer a steadying hand and an encouraging word. He is the perfect traveling companion.