DAY EIGHT - TUESDAY, MAY 18, 2004

My final day in Lima.

Hello everyone. RT here.

Well, my plans for today included a 'set up' date with a relative of a travel agent here in Ft. Lauderdale, and I was going to try my hand at a civilian date with a girl who I met in one of the tiendas while I was buying tourist crap. My fallback was an outcall from one of the agencies. I didn't have all night, as I had to be out of the hotel by 5 or 5:30 in the morning for my flight home. Not much of that happened, but I had a good day anyway.

It was a regular travel morning for me: Wake up, take a bunch of sinus pills (I was eating them like they were M&Ms), drink something hot and post my report from the previous day. I got back to the hotel in time to shower and shave and be ready for Kimberly at 11:30.

She shows up at 11:20. A nice enough girl, but she speaks no English and (sue me for being a shallow pig), wasn't a raving beauty. Not fat, not thin, not ugly, not gorgeous. A regular girl. Granted, I don't have many 23-year-old regular girls dying to go out with me back home, but that's not why I went to Lima.

Mensch that I am, we spent a half hour talking in the lobby (kudos to the hotel staff for both helping translate once or twice and not acting shocked that I was actually spending time in the lobby with a girl. I finally get her to agree to go out to get lunch, so we get a taxi to the Larco Mar mall complex.

I had been to Larco Mar at night, looking for the 'stare'. Incredibly, it's a real mall in the daytime. Restaurants, stores, movie theater, food court, everything. We pick a restaurant (I forget the name) that's right on the edge of the mall, on a cliff, overlooking the ocean. The spot was beautiful. Worth a trip there in the daytime for the aesthetics alone.

Lunch was good, albeit a little pricey. I had cebiche and a seafood soup, and Kimberly had something and a steak. She was thrilled. I don't think that she gets to go out to eat very much. We managed to converse with my bad Spanish, and I agree to go see where she lives, all the time aware that I want to be done with her by 3, so I can pick up my photos and work on the girl for my night's entertainment.

Kimberly lived way the fuck over on the other side of Lima, right by the airport. It was a 30 minute ride, and cost a whopping $3 to get there. When we get to her house, the whole family (dad, sister, brother) is waiting to meet me. God only knows what the travel agent told these people, but I was getting in a deeper hole than I wanted to be in. I had to socialize for a while, then I finally was able to convince them that I was tired from my trip up the mountain and needed to take a nap.

Fifteen minutes later, I got them to understand that I wanted to sleep in my bed, not theirs, and they let me leave soon after, walking me down, getting me a taxi, taking some pictures, and waving good-bye.

I get back to Miraflores by 4 (finally), and head over to the photo shop. They downloaded my pictures and promised me the prints by noon. My bad, I didn't ask noon which day. They then saw that I was upset. Although they couldn't understand why, they promised that the pictures would be ready by 6 pm. I didn't believe them, and also, I didn't know when the girls got off of work, so I just took my money back and walked back to the hotel all pissed off, forgetting about seeing Isabel that evening.

To make myself feel better, I stopped for some more cebiche on the way, and then took a nap back at the hotel.

I woke up a little later, and counted my money. Between mostly winning at gambling and spending three celibate days at the convention, I still had plenty left. In my mind, that added up to a serious blackjack session, and then the best expensive outcall I could find, before finishing my packing and getting to the airport by 5:30 or so.

I get dressed for the evening and head first for the Casino New York. It is huge and somewhere in San Isidro, you can't miss it -- there's so much neon that they can see it from the Space Shuttle. Alas, I was given bad information somewhere along the way. Casino New York has slot machines ONLY. Millions of 'em, but just slot machines. Not my bag, so I got a taxi tot he Hotel Delfines, also in San Isidro (sorry, but I had already packed my GPS, so no coordinates. All the taxi drivers know both places).

The Casino at the Hotel Delfines is very nice. The first floor is (what else) all slots, and there are a bunch of levels below. Each of the lower levels (just a few steps apart) has a different game. There was roulette, Caribbean Poker, maybe something else, and blackjack. There were six tables in the blackjack area, with $3, $5 and $25 minimums. It was a pleasant table and casino, but I was just treading water, and left after an hour down about $20. I decided to head to my local favorite, the Hacienda.

The trip to the Hacienda passed by the Starbucks, and the taxi driver stopped to let me buy us both drinks. Why not, the coffee was more expensive than the cab ride. I enter, and get a seat at a table. Things immediately ground to a halt as I have to explain (in really bad Spanish) what and where Starbucks is, and why anyone on earth would pay more than $2 for a cup of coffee. After convincing them that I was just an Americano Loco, things got back to the normal business of gambling.

It just wasn't my night for gambling. I hung around for two more hours, and still managed to not win or lose very much. Even with doubling and tripling my bets, I wound up down only $45 for the night. I left and headed back to the hotel.

If it seems to you that I was reluctant to go the outcall route, you're right. Strange, but I do it all the time back home.

I just wasn't convinced that I could manage the negotiations/requests over the telephone, and it was just too easy to find my own, either in Pizza Alley or at Tequila Rock.

Before breaking down and calling, I decided to take a last walk through Pizza Alley. I leave the hotel, and don't even get to the alley entrance when I am called over by a girl claiming to have seen me drinking with my buddies in Larco Mar the other night. Now, I don't drink, and the only thing I did in Larco Mar at night was walk, so I knew that it was a line, but she was young and cute, so, giving her an 'A' for effort, I stopped an talked to her.

I asked Christina of she wanted to go and have a drink, and of course she agreed. She was thin with long, slightly wavy brown hair, and friendly. Once again, just my type. She picks a restaurant, we order drinks and she declines food, telling me that she can't afford food. The hard sell begins, lucky for me that I was buying.

We talk a little, and it turns out that she needs to pay for English class and get books tomorrow(!!!). Where's my hotel is the next question, followed by, "can we go and watch TV?" Off we went.

The Hotel Las Palmas does not check girls' IDs when you bring them back to the hotel. This surprised Christina, as she was ready with an ID. We get upstairs, put on the TV, take a couple of pictures, and cuddle on the bed. I get the hard sell one more time, and I finally tell her not to worry, I have a present for her.

Like every other girl in Lima, Christina is a good kisser. Things proceed as they needed to, with the session ending with an enthusiastic, but unpracticed French session. We lay there some more and watch TV (music stations). Getting dressed, I gave her $50 and told her to have good luck in English school. I again think that I overpaid, because she insisted that I take her email address and phone number, all the while listening to her bemoan the fact that I was going home in the morning.

Anyway, Christina left, I grabbed three hours sleep, and got ready to leave. Checkout was uneventful. They were able to prepare an accurate bill quickly. Even at 4:30 in the morning, getting a taxi was no problem. The driver first wanted $10, but quickly settled for $7.15. The security was pretty thorough checking in. Having American Airlines Gold status saved me a bunch of time and waiting, so, once again, I am further hooked into AA's tentacles.

FINAL THOUGHTS: I will be going back to Lima, at least twice more.
1. I need to go there and recognize my rookie status. Don't try to re-invent the wheel, and just go with the flow.
2. The people there are really nice. I didn't see a pissed off Peruvian my entire trip.
3. If I wanted, I could have a real date every night. I want to at least try that out once or twice. And, I promised Isabel that I would take her out.
4. Turkish baths are awesome. Even if you're not trying to get laid, you have a great few hours for like $20-30. The Banos Turkos Palacio has been highly recommended.
5. I want to go to the Sunday Brunch at Costa Verde. Hell, if it is good enough for the Guinness people...
6. Outcall. How can it hurt?
7. Renting a cell phone was a great idea. The total cost was $22.86, and I had the comfort of always being able to be in touch, even when I was wandering around the Andes mountains, I was able to give the number to my family, just in case, and it really impressed the girls.
8. Machu Piccu. Up in the mountains (elev. 12,000) feet. I hear it is fabulous, bad sinuses and all.

COUPLE OF DOWN SIDES:
1. Of all the Latino places I've been, Peru was the least English-friendly. Not the least friendly, just not much English. And their Spanish was a little different from what I knew, so it caused some challenges.
2. With one exception, CBJ was the norm. I never pressed the issue (I let the girls do what they're comfortable with), so I don't know how negotiable that is. But to a lot of guys, that's very important.

THINGS I WOULD DO DIFFERENTLY:
1. As stated above, just go with the tried and true. At least for a while.
2. I would choose my flights differently. The only flights that I could upgrade to first class on were in the middle of the night. If that's the case next time, I would consider flying coach at better times, even though it is a five hour flight.
3. Outcall. They're rumored to have some stunning girls for about $100.
4. I will bite the bullet and (at least once) go to one of the clip joint spots and take a girl out from there. Refer to item number one, above.

That's about it. Thanks for taking the time to read my ramblings.

Thanks for your report. I agree with many of your points. Very few people there speak English. Not even a little. I didn't come across any taxi drivers that spoke English.

Most of the normal girls I saw on the street I wasn't attracted to. However, at places like Larco Mar on a weekend night you'd see many attractive girls at places like Mango's Restaurant and some of the bars there.

The people there are really friendly and there is a lot of history and natural beauty in Peru. It probably has more interesting history than anywhere in South America.

I never saw any attractive girls in the lower end places like Pizza Alley. Not a one. (I'm talking the working girls). A few of the girls handing out flyers were kind of cute.

I also agree it's easy to get normal dates. I'm on cybercupidos and got several emails from girls wanted to hook up. Most gave me their phone number on the first or second email. I was going to hook up then thought to myself why bother?

Go figure a few weeks after I leave this actual model emails me and invited me to her house! Crap! Why not while I was there.

The economy there is pretty bad but still I found nice restaurants to be pricey for South America. Besides in the downtown historic area, Miraflores, San Isidro and Barranco the city was not beautiful and dirty. There is no mass transit system there either which is hard to believe for a city of it's size.

I don't think Lima is a city you go for just for hobbying. If you're going to sightsee and seeing girls is a secondary delight then it's decent if you're not afraid to spend money. The really beautiful hottie girls were in the high end clubs. And as RTGooch figured out..it's damn expensive in those places.

I'm sure clubs change but the best one I found was Emmanuelle. I saw several beautiful girls in there but it was expensive. I think I paid something like $100 for two hours, 50 Soles entrance fee ($15), and an exit fee of 120 Soles ($35). So about $150 all told for 2 hours. The session was great though.

The other club I went to 69 was good too with good talent. I still email with one of the hottie girls I saw there. Awesome session. But again pricey.

For really good action with a model type girl I don't think you're going to spend any less than $100 US. Thanks again for the report.