A k a day in Lima Peru (Day 16)

 Well it was something of a relief to reach our third Sunday on this challenge but the first where we are not on total lockdown. Lima has moved from "extreme" level of COVID to "very severe" and that is enough to allow us exercise on Sundays. So it was with great excitement that we set off on our usual course today, knowing that it would get us over the hump and past half way. It was busy today with what seemed like half of Lima using it for cycling and the other half for walking. There was much more space for social distancing though because with no traffic we could use the roads as well as the path. We passed our favourite sign and so snapped a selfie. "Tu actitud hace la diferencia" - your attitude makes the difference.

It is actually only aimed at COVID and is giving guidelines as to social distancing when exercising. Different levels of separation depending on the activity.

I got to thinking however, how true that is in all walks of life. You cannot control the obstacles that are placed in your way but how you react to them is a choice.

Not everyone is obeying the rules because the knife sharpener was out and about offering to sharpen your knives with his portable knife sharpening machine. He obviously took his wee boy with him. I wish I had been able to get a recording of the noise he makes when trying to summon up some business. It is a very odd sound. I'll try to capture it for you before the blog meets its end.

Yesterday I promised to pick up the three parks story so in the absence of any additional excitement today I will do just that. After we had been at park number one with it's statues, market and hen party we walked a short distance to another park. There are small parks every few block in Lima and this was indeed quite a small one. Like the others it was pretty well tended and as we came closer to the name board I was quiet surprised to find that it was called Parque Chabuca Granda. Now if you are an avid reader of these missives then you cannot fail to recall that the bold Chabuca was a famous singer who has a statue in Barranco. Well she also has a park named after her in Santiago de Surco. I am excitedly waiting for the Dave Spittal Park to be opened in Glenrothes. Surely it is in the planning stage at least.

After the thrill of another Chabuca encounter we headed on the park 3 the smallest of the three. It seemingly had little to offer, was rather devoid of any excitement but then suddenly we spotted an opportunity to get a decent picture of our lovely wee saffron finch.

Isn't he a beauty? They are probably about as common here as sparrows are in Scotland so it is not a rare sight but nevertheless he was pretty. I was feeling pretty pleased with my photography when suddenly flashing past our eyes we saw a brief glimpse of bright red.  Again if you have paid attention I mentioned a day or two ago about a vivid red bird that we had been unable to get a decent photo. Well this was another but this time he was quite close and had landed on a telegraph wire. I quickly got the camera back out and managed to snap a few reasonable shots considering his location.

We watched him for a minute or two before he flew off but to our amazement he flew almost straight towards us. He flew down to a crack in the pavement only about 2 meters (you can call that 2 yards for those who have not been decimalised) from us and then back up to the wire. We watched and he did it again. I looked carefully at the crack and saw a small insect emerge from it. Then a moment later a bigger insect came out and whoosh our bird friend swooped like a tiny red missile and grabbed it before returning to his vantage point. This continued for a couple of minutes before the bird lost interest having clearly had his fill of small insects for the time being.

Research at home revealed this bird to be a Vermillion Flycatcher. He is well named for sure.

Ornithology over for today we headed home and on route we spotted one of these. What do you think it is for? I will let you think for a bit what might it be used for?

Well did you think? 

Houses here do not have bins for the garbage so you put your garbage out in one of these baskets and it is collected overnight every night. We just have to put ours outside or apartment door and Felipe or Julio our two building porters collect it and make it disappear. Although recycling is beginning to take hold here it is a long way behind. Having said that there are plenty bin rakers who rummage through the trash and take anything that has any value so it is maybe a lot better than we might first think.

Well, well, another not so lazy Sunday. It's still only 2pm here so still plenty work to be done to get ready for work tomorrow.

Take care.

Lima out.