Chancay

A great night sleep for some but not me. I stayed awake thinking about my CV axle that is clicking and leaking grease and how to get it fixed in Lima. They don't sell my van in South America although Stellantis makes a Fiat, Peugeot, and Citroen version and I have seen Peugeot ambulance vans in Peru, but I am not certain what to guts are similar between my Ram and those brands. 

We also didn't have a plan for today. The hardest thing to find is secure parking for the RV in a big city. There are some hotels on ioverlander but they are not up to what I think my family's standards are. We let the kids play until noon with the other kids and I did all my chores: rinsed the cassette and filled the water. I booked a room at a hotel Christine sent to me and found a parking lot not far and a laundromat.

We went to find lunch in Chancay and the restaurants by the plaza de armas were busy and there were four Chifa restaurants which interested the kids. The bay north of Chancay is the site of Chinese development, part of their Belt and Road foreign aid policy to spread Chinese favoritism and goodwill. Maybe that's why tuere were so many Chifa restaurants here. There was even a chinese colony association. The Japanese and Chinese have been immigrants to Peru for 150 years. We stopped at one Chifa that had steamed baos and ordered a couple combination plates and Christine wanted a burger so I went around the corner and bought her a $2 burger. The food was okay.

Dd had a fever this morning but Ellie had been fever free for 24h and Christine had been slowly recovering. I am just waiting to get sick but feel fine so far. We headed off to Lima, 90 minutes south. We drove up a massive sand dune and there was an electric scooter riding up. Then a long downhill and that was the end of the tollway and it was speedbumps and traffic to Lima.

Google maps directed us to the coast of Lima where there were recreational places and people riding paragliders and we turned inland at Miraflores where we booked a hotel at the Dazzler. Unfortunately they had no advice for secure parking for our RV which was too tall for their garage other than street parking. The parking lot I found on Google maps was now for a restaurant and its customers. We found street parking a block away.

The hotel was nice and they gave us a suite. The Laundromat I had in mind was now closed as it was 5pm and we went to get some Japanese food near the RV. 

The Japanese was not surprisingly very good. We had the usual: gyozas, tempura, ramen, and a sushi roll. A mainland Chinese family sat across from us but spoke Spanish to the waitress. The bill came to $55. 

We went back and luxuriated in the first bathtub experience since being in San Diego in September. Tomorrow we do laundry and try to figure out the CV axle.