Doug writes:
Experienced blog readers will appreciate that, owing to strict editorial guidelines, the blog is uploaded by about 1800hrs local time; I assume the core team has developed this habit in order to avoid too many Pisco Sour-influenced chunks of prose. Anyway it falls to me on Tuesday’s blog to document our much-awaited big treat on Monday evening, our last night in Lima, of a team visit to Maido, 7th best restaurant in the world according to the fairly authoritative (so JP says anyway) ‘Worlds 50 Best Restaurants’ awards – also recently voted best in Latin America.
Maido, only a 5-minute stroll from our hotel in the upmarket Miraflores district, boasts Japanese / Peruvian cuisine – not as odd as you might think, Peru having a large population of Japanese immigrants dating from the early 20th century.
As we entered its hallowed halls we were chuffed to be greeted by a team shout from the staff, at least until we learned that all guests merit the same greeting. The ambience was, according to Chris, a bit “ropey” – the decor comprising bare wooden table and thousands of ropes hanging from the ceiling.
An excellent meal was had, some highlights being John’s 50-hour cooked beef (no steak knife required, they give you a spoon to cut it with..)
and my slow-cooked pork which had the best-ever crackling. The sommelier was a rather serious Argentinian lady who knew the Finca Ambrosia winemaker Daniel Pi. John did a lot of sucking up in the hope of getting her to take on a few cases of his plonk for Maido and now has her email address!
Our overall verdict – brilliant, if slightly fussy grub; excellent staff, nice atmosphere but at £100 a head – ouch! We were not too sure whether it merits the “best in the world” tag but it was certainly an experience.. I reckon the Greggs on Lothian Road has it knocked into a cocked hat.
Tuesday AM and, well slept after our big treat, Chris fired up Two-Ton Tess the Bolivian Bolide aka our Nissan Patrol. Gargling a couple of pints of one-star petrol as a wake-up call, she lurched into action.
Leaving early to avoid the Lima rush hour, we trundled South; as soon as we cleared Lima the landscape became desert-like with massive sand dunes port and starboard. The view to our right for the first few miles comprised deserted beach resorts sporting optimistic names such as Gran Canaria, Playa Menorca etc. Perhaps these get busy in the local Summer time but certainly not today and to be honest in the hazy atmosphere characteristic of the Lima area (smog?) they didn’t look too inviting.
We stopped briefly at one “Playa Turisto”, parked above the tide line and wandered down to the sea for a paddle. The mighty Pacific rolled in – this place must be a surfer’s paradise but is completely deserted, at least of people although there were plenty of orange crabs and assorted seabirds.
Sadly, like the entire length of today’s road, the beach was a mess, covered in litter. If you follow one of the many public buses, be prepared to dodge the food cartons chucked out of the window.
We continued through the barren landscape, happy that the haze was dropping off and the sun was now shining. Our lunch stop was at Huacachina, an oasis 100-odd miles South of Lima. Mike and John risked sunstroke by pegging up one of the massive surrounding sand dunes, getting some good pics of the oasis itself and the Mad Max-style sand buggies which are offered to all tourists at least a dozen times by persistent salesmen.
Having already had our fill of post-apocalyptic high-speed road-warrior action, we declined – I should add that normal driving on these roads includes overtaking on blind bends or up the inside hard shoulder and persistent horn honking, especially by the Tuk-Tuk drivers who must, I think, be compensating for something.
Every few miles we stopped to fill up with 95-octane which costs about 30p a litre here. Tess was found to be slurping her way through about 19.2 litres per 100 km or 14 miles per gallon – for the technically minded it’s a 4.2 litre straight six.
That aside she is doing a splendid job; slightly ponderous to change gear and a fair amount of backlash in all the transmission hardware lurking under our bottoms, but all her systems work OK except the radio. Our fallback, of a Bluetooth speaker acquired by Chris at Lima Woolies, turned out to be of slightly lower sound quality than your average Bose or Sonos – but not to worry..
Past Huacahina the landscape became a bit more spaghetti-western than basic desert, with humpy wee hills and mostly-dry valleys but still never a blade of grass
By 4 pm we were coasting into the township of Nazca where we have now checked in at quite a nice hotel. A quick dip in the pool was ideal for washing off the dust of the road after 436 km.
Tomorrow it’s an early start for another big treat, an aeroplane trip to view the mysterious Nazca lines!
Our America’s Challenge Drive 