Thanks y'all. The trip was great. One pleasant surprise was finding out that Peru is the gastronomic center of South America. I did not have one bad meal there. In fact, I think I ate a few of the best meals of my life there - the food is that good. I even ate guinea pig one night. It's a traditional Andean dish and was quite tasty. Pics will have to wait until next trip since I lost my memory card. I have a few on my phone though... maybe I'll post one of those.
I spent all my time in Lima except for one weekend trip down into the desert to hit the beach. I have some trips planned for later in the year to see the Amazon, Machu Pichu, etc. but work has to come first. : (
Peru's food was fantastic, but alas... her wine is not. I tried a few different wines and they were all pretty bad. 90% (or so) of the grapes go to making the national drink, which is Pisco... a distilled wine. It tastes a bit like tequilla if you shoot it, but when you sip and compare with others you can really taste the complexity. I guess their wine production is still new. That's not to say I didn't have some great wine while I was there though... I had plenty of Chilean and Argentinean wines that were out of this world. And inexpensive too! With the exchange rate you can pick up a GREAT bottle of wine for about $3!! : )
Speaking of wine... I have about 18 batches of wine here and they all need some type of care. I've been so busy all week trying to get other things done that I have not had a chance to work on any wine related activities.
The meads look good. The ancient orange cleared up nice while I was away - still have not tasted it yet though.
It's awesome to see all the new names on the forum, but even better to see the "old" ones. I missed you guys <sniff>.