North Peru

We crossed the border into Peru at the ridiculously early hour of 4am and then continued on to Piura where we got a bus to Máncora - a beach resort on the North Coast. The hostel we stayed in was located right on the beach and had a bit of a party atmosphere. This wasn't so good to begin with as we could have done with catching up with some sleep and the music was playing so loud we thought there was a speaker in our room!

However, we later got into the spirit of things. It was a staff members birthday so they had a bonfire and drink promotions and the celebrations went on until the early hours.

We spent a couple more days in Mancora, spending a bit of time on the beach, hanging around at the hostel and playing a bit of beach volleyball. Our last day was Halloween so throughout the day there were games such as jelly wrestling taking place. We missed the party that night as we got an overnight bus to Trujillo, but have heard rumours that it wasn't actually that good!

The hostel we stayed at in Trujillo offered tours to the nearby pre-Inca ruins of Chan Chan and Huacas de Luna y Sol so we signed up for this the day we arrived with two others: Laura who we'd travelled down with from Mancora and Steve, an old America guy who we'd previously met in Cali.

It was a tight squeeze in the hostel owners old VW Beetle which was used for the tour, although the journey in this around Trujillo was probably the highlight of the trip. The guide didn't speak very good English so it was hard to understand what she was saying about either of the sites.

The next morning Ellie went on ahead to Huaraz with Laura whilst Mike went to Huancayo to do some surfing. The journey to Huaraz involved some very tight corners on steep mountains with huge drops below and had some amazing scenary.

Huaraz is a town up in the Cordillera Blanco y Negra mountain range and is a base for mountain biking, trekking and horse riding. Ellie went horse riding with Laura one day up the Cordillera Negra - the horse was very slow and tired, but got some great views ofthe Cordillera Blanco mountains which have snow at the top of them.

After Huaraz we got the night bus to Lima where we spent 5 nights - longer than planned as some friends we'd met in Vilcabamba were coming down for the weekend. We spent the first few days seeing the sights around Central Lima and Miraflores where we were staying. Last time Ellie was in Lima 8 years ago there were large protests taking place in the main plaza so it was good for her to see it again on a normal day. We also had a tour of the San Francisco Monestry, which has catacombs under the building, and the Spanish Inquisition museum.

On Friday, Liz and Conner arrived so we had a few drinks with them, and then a big night out on Saturday when Clare and Maria arrived too. We went out to a bar in Barranco and then onto a club in Miraflores.