There are many compelling reasons to visit Peru, famed for its sky high ruins, ancient cultural traditions, and for bringing the world the potato, but our 25-hour Lima layover leaves scant opportunity to venture beyond the teeming seaside capital.  Mind you, with 43 distinct districts and a population of 7.6 million, and a history stretching back to the sixteenth century, there’s still plenty to see and do in the world’s 40th-largest city.  All of which any guide book from your local library can fill you in on.  If it’s info on sights, tours, and local currency that you seek, get thee to Lonely Planet.com. 

When I’m at work, cities where people live, work, and frolic on vacation are reduced to a series of three-letter codes in the computer that are paired up to tell us where we’re going, what time we’re supposed to get there, and nothing else.  And often that’s all we care about — Tokyo and Toronto are strikingly similar cities when seen from inside an airport hotel room.  Here, in a new Mister Stewardess Feature, City Code Snapshots will occasionally give you a quick glimpse of what stands out to me as the highlight of a given destination when seen through the eyes of working crew, just passing through with little time and even less money.  And since I hardly ever fly international any more, and will probably talk a lot about Iowa in this space, we’ll start big with last week’s trip to Lima. Continue reading →