Made it to Lima, Peru

Just arrived in Lima, Peru, after about a month of traveling from Lome, Togo. (And some people think the mail is slow when it takes a couple of days for a letter to get across town!)

I am now the guest of Charisse and Greg Phillips. They both work for the U.S. embassy in Lima.

Peru is on the west coast of South American. It is next to Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Colombia and Ecuador. (If you click on the map on the right, you can see a bigger version of it.)

The Andes Mountains go right through the country. And these are very very high mountains.

One of the most famous places in Peru is at the top of the mountain range.

The place is called Machu Pichu.

It was the ancient home of the Incas.

Here is a picture of the place.

I have already learned there are lots of interesting things about Peru.

To begin with, Peruvians claim the potato was first cultivated here. Not in Idaho or Ohio or Michigan but in Peru.

Pretty cool huh?

Peru also has some very weird animals. Here is a picture of a llama. (If you say that word in English the first two letters sound like an "L" but in Spanish the sound like a "Y." So in Spanish what English speakers call a LAMA, the Peruvians call a "YA-ma."