Lima: City of Kings...or...CATS!



Every darn tootin´ place I´ve been to on this backpacking trip thus far has been overrun by four-legged creatures with wagging tails, nasty breath and endless yapping. In fact, in Quito, every home seemed to have its very own guard dog who lived on the rooftop 24/7 and would bark incessantly whenever the wind blew (which meant they practically never stopped yapping thus negating the need for alarm clocks or roosters). But in Lima?!? I was delightfully surprised to encounter MUCHO GATOS!! Meow Mix indeed.

First of all we had Janis, the Siamese cat, in temporary residence at Pucllana Lodge whom I mentioned in my previous blog entry. But on Monday (Nov 28) I happened to be walking in Parque Kennedy in the Miraflores District when I spied a congregation of homeless cats being fed beside the church there. I actually did a double-take as I walked past for my eyes could not believe what they were seeing! There were at least 30 cats blanketing the lane and their meowing was music to my ears! Apparently these cats are abandoned by their owners and hang out in this area because they are regularly fed by sympathetic local animal lovers, including some of the construction workers on a nearby worksite. There is even a little sign posted there which encourages passersby to help take care of them. A lady asked if I wanted to adopt one of them and I oh so
would´ve if I could´ve! But I did the next best thing and bought some chicken and a bag of dry cat food at a nearby supermarket and then fed the sweet critters. They surrounded me as I was feeding them and if ever the term ¨Cat Lady¨were appropriate, it was at that moment, he he.

Feeding the homeless Miraflores cats made my heart swell and the cats, of course, purrrrrrrr.......

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Overlanding in Namibia Part III

Image
Namib-Naukluft, Namibia to Cape Town, South Africa (April 3-8) Originally our ACACIA bus was due to depart from Swakopmund in the early morning so that we could reach our next night's campsite just outside the Namib-Naukluft National Park in the early afternoon. However, our seemingly invincible (and yet sadly not) bus driver Patrick had been diagnosed with cerebral malaria while in Swakopmund and was too ill to continue on as our driver. Therefore, ACACIA had lickedy split found us a replacement driver and flew him out from Jo'burg to meet us at the nearest international airport on our route, that being in Walvis Bay. Our new driver, TJ, a colossal ginger-haired South African fellow sporting dreadlocks who had apparently dropped close to 25 kilos on the Atkins Diet, once through customs, hopped behind the wheel of our truck as if Patrick had simply been keeping his seat warm and......OFF WE SPED! We arrived at our campsite, which was in the southern end of the Namib Desert
Read more

Overlanding in Namibia Part II

Image
Spitzkoppe to Swakopmund, Namibia (March 31-April 3) Spitzkoppe (March 31-April 1) Our third day overlanding brought us to Spitzkop, i.e. "the Matterhorn of Namibia." It is an area of great natural beauty consisting of a group of red rocky granite peaks rising spectacularly above the surrounding flat plains. We camped near the largest peak (1787m) and went on a short guided walk of the area in the late afternoon. During our exploratory walk, we were shown some Bushmen rock paintings that depicted different animals. The red color used in some of these paintings was achieved, so we were told, using a mixture of iron and sacrificial animal blood. Umm...lovely? Our guide kept checking his watch and trying to hurry us along for he had planned for us to reach the "rock bridge" in time to watch the sunset. Unfortunately, time was not on our side due to our dawdling so the guide suddenly urged us to " Run! (Forest) Run!! " And off we all went, sprinting towa
Read more

In the footsteps of the Incas - Part I

Image
Coming to Cusco and the Sacred Valley, I was determined to do some trekking. Being a solo traveller though meant I had to find some group with which to walk. I had purchased the South American Explorers´Handbook on Alternative Inca Trails and a number of them sounded promising and incredibly challenging to my weary bones/joints, but it was a matter of finding a group departing within both my time frame and price range. I emailed a number of the more reputable trekking companies and also visited the office of Q'Ente. Based on all of the info I gathered, I opted to go with Q'Ente even though they´re one of the more expensive companies as they have a sound history when it comes to treating their porters/guides/cooks fairly and they also believe in sustainable tourism which respects the environment. I joined a group of 5 hikers (that`s including me!) on the Salkantay Trek which lasts 5 days with the last day being a visit to the stupendous Inca site, Machu Picchu. I attended a
Read more