After many hikes at high altitude, many times freezing my hands while taking landscape pictures – we finally arrived in warmer regions: The nothern coast of Peru.

We made our way to Trujillo by bus from Lima (Linea, 8hrs) during the day, so we arrived just after nightfall. The Plaza de Armas of Trujillo is very pretty lit by night with it’s colourful colonial houses in the old center. We had a quick dinner close to the plaza: Fresh fish as it should once you are at the coast. Then we took a taxi to take us to the adjecent town of Huanchaco.

Huanchaco is a surfer town and we quickly realized that once we entered the hostel (Frogs Hostel). our room had a beautiful view over the sea and the smell and warmth of the wind were exactly what I needed now. The next day we went to the pre-inca ruins of Trujillo called Chan Chan. It’s a big area full of very old temples which are dispersed even into the city of Trujillo and along the sea. Thus to get to all of them it’s best to go by taxi.

The people of Chan Chan had a very nice believe. They believed in a moon god instead of the sun, because they had observed that the moon was visible also when the sun was shining, and thus must be more powerful. They had an advanced watering system for their crops made of canals. They worshipped the sea and it’s animals, which is visible in all their decoration: The walls are lined with fishnets, waves, fish, pelicans and other marine animals. What I liked a lot was their ceramics. They made pots and cups that looked like the vegetables that they grew. Chan Chan was a very nice site to visit and I would definitely recommend it.

Later that day we returned to Huanchaco for some food and drinks. The beach of Huanchaco is lined with many touristic restaurants, surf schools and mandala hostels (speak yoga, surf, vegan). Since our room had a balcony with a hammock we watched the sunset from up there and saw the sky turn pink and purple. Beautiful!

In the evening we took two bikes and went into town, hoping to find some nice place to eat veggies! Yes we were craving veggies so much, since in Peru you often only get a side of rice with fries… We found a great place at the promenade called Lighthouse. They were happy to make our wish come true, even though it wasn’t on the menu. We got fresh shrimps and veggies from the grill with two cool lemonades 👌 still dreaming about it, since it was perfect. Ok so much to our dinner.

What else? For us it was a pleasure to watch the locals surfing and see some kids already riding big waves! If we had more time we would have taken some lessons ourselves, but well, another time.

The next stop was Chachapoyas, close to the Amazon. To get there we took a bus to Trujillo and a taxi to the very new and modern bus terminal. With Moviltours we made it comfortably through those 16 hours. Read more about Chachapoyas in our next post!