Walking Previously Walked Streets to the Museo de Minerales

José de San Martín and the Carob Tree

I've walked the streets of Lima's Centro Historico about a million times. Well, four or five times. That's close to a million. If you round up.

There are a few hidden "gems" in the Centro Historico that I've not yet visited. See what I did there? "Gems"? When the new spot in the Centro Historico for today's walkabout is the Museo de Minerales Andrés del Castillo, a museum dedicated to gem-like mineral crystals. In an old mansion.

The museum is about three-quarters of mile walking distance from the hotel I call my Lima home. Actually, I don't call it that at all. I call it "my hotel," which is a more accurate description.

As with yesterday, I will end up at the Plaza José de San Martín. But, spicing things up with a little variety, this time I walk down Jirón de la Unión instead of Jirón Carabaya. Jirón de la Unión will take me to the west side of Plaza José de San Martín, while Jirón Carabaya took me to the west side. 

This is the building that sits across the street from the southwest flank of Plaza José de San Martín, which is a perfect diamond, in that the grid of the Centro Historico is not oriented perfectly east/north/west/south.

This is the Teatro Colon.

I'm not sure what kind of Teatro it is. I am guessing performing arts rather than movies because, well, does that look like a movie theater?

Again, so many nice buildings that are just ordinary buildings on ordinary streets. Except this one:

That is the repurposed old mansion that now houses the Museo de Minerales Andrés del Castillo. Let's take a look at all those photogenic mineral crystals, shall we?

This might be the most expensive museum I have entered in Lima thus far. Admission? Twenty soles. Twenty! Dollar equivalent? Less than six bucks. And that's the most expensive museum admission price (I believe) I paid in Lima.

The first room of the 15 rooms of exhibits was dedicated to temporary exhibit space. Which meant modern art because of course it would mean modern art.

I don't know, but I am guessing that the artist who did this one was inspired by Spanish painter Diego Velázquez's cryptic masterpiece Las Meninas. The artist on temporary exhibit here does have a name. And that name is: David Habibzedah.

We now come to the part of the programming where I go on a tirade about the celebration of no-talent ugliness that is modernism and post-modernism in art:

But I'm not going to go there. Maybe I'm getting soft in my dotage, but I actually see real talent in the above work. It is extremely impressive -- and, no, I am not being sarcastically facetious here -- that the artist can take a few slashes of color and actually make them recognizable human forms. This is not abstract expressionism, the last refuge of the talentless. This is an artist using modern art conventions to create actual recognizable human forms. I'm shocked at myself for thinking this. Quick: somebody grab me a Jackson Pollock or a Kandinsky or a Rothko so I can go off on the mutilated horror show that is modern art.

Let's move on the rooms of crystals.

Mineral crystals in the display cases. Religious art on the walls.

I don't really know enough about these crystals to add any commentary other than "wow aren't these cool looking." And what would that add.

These crystals are green:

Which means: I like.

I do need to warn you about this:

The crystals did come naturally in the shape of ducks. Or even the duck eggs. Not sure about the crystal bansai tree in the back.

Again, I think these have been worked on:

Crystals are not found in nature in the shape of green fish. I'm so out of my depth on these crystals that I not even sure if the basic rule of "green means the presence of copper in the crystal" applies here or not.

Nine rooms of crystals. Then three rooms of pre-hispanic (pre-Columbian) pottery, which, again, I shock myself on this, I love this stuff:

I have never seen the timeline of indigenous Peruvian cultures laid out like the above. North, central, and southern Peru, along the time line, with an example of the pottery of that particular culture used as the placeholder. I want one of these on my living room wall! Think I can order it on Amazon?

This one, to me, was especially cool:

With all those small animal like creatures popping up randomly on the guy, it looks like a pottery version of a puppet show. Maybe my imagination is getting a little over-active here, but that's what it looks like to me.

This guy looks like he walked over from the Moche culture exhibit/

If I have to explain, the point is lost. This is actually in the funerary pottery section:

As are these:

I'm guessing these are funerary because they were found in tombs? The middle one definitely would be from a Moche tomb, those pervs.

And, finally, one room of San Marcos boxes.

I don't know why these are called "San Marcos boxes," but I've seen them call this at other museums, so it's a real term.

They look like a little mini-altar piece from home use and display. Is that correct? I don't know. I just know that's what they look like they would be for.

Time to leave the museum that was the reason for the day's walk to the Centro Historico.

Time for what has been my favorite thing in Lima -- other than eating Peruvian churros filled with manjar blanco -- which is basically (to over-simplify things) Peruvian dulce de leche -- you will never ever settle for a Mexican churro after you've had a Peruvian churro -- and that favorite thing has been: photographing up a storm in the Plaza José de San Martín:

Another look at Teatro Colon:

Apparently I took a lot of pictures of José de San Martín on his horse in his plaza.

This is the Cooperativa de Ahorro y Credito La Portuaria.

Sounds impressive. Looks impressive. Again, picking up on the theme of ordinary buildings on ordinary streets being so beautiful in Lima, that building there? It's just a credit union.

I believe from the pods hanging off these trees on a late summer day in Lima that these are South American carob trees. These are not related to the carob trees of the Old World, maybe from Middle East or Eastern Mediterranean which produce a pod that tastes like chocolate. If chocolate were mixed with Tide detergent.

The South American carob tree produced a chocolate-like substance, known as algarrobina, which is absolutely delicious. Last time here, I bought a bottle of pisco cream liqueur that was algarrobina flavored. It was so delicious and I drank it so fast that I raced back to Lima to buy another bottle. Which I did. But only one. Maybe I should go back to the store tomorrow and buy a second? Or a third?

The man on the horse seen riding through the trees.

One thing about Lima is that there all these delivery carts carrying fresh fruits and vegetables be pushed through the streets of the Centro Historico. When I saw one filled with oranges, the smell of fresh oranges was over-powering. Last night, I smelled an apple cart with an overwhelming apple smell. This was an avocado cart.

Avocados don't really have a smell. So when the avocado cart went past me, I was not overwhelmed by the smell of avocado.

At this point, I'm spending most of my time here in Lima just sitting around and soaking in the atmosphere. I'm well past the point that I need to spend all my vacation time doing something.

Circuitos Magicos del Agua

A busy Saturday night at the Circuitos Magicos del Agua

Lots happening on a Saturday night on the periphery of Lima's Centro Historico. There was a massive parade/demonstration in front of my hotel -- probably it was in front of the Palace of Judicial Power across the plaza from my hotel -- in celebration of Peruvian's Woman's Day 2026.

(I will say this about Peruvian women and their day and their demonstrating in this neighborhood. It was loud Thursday night. It was louder Friday night. And it was even louder Saturday night. But, by 10:00 p.m., a reasonable sleeping hour: dead silent. What a polite group of celebratory protestors! There is absolutely nothing wrong with being exuberantly loud in the evening when everything becomes "tranquilo" when it's time for the good people of Lima to go to sleep.)

The plan was to walk the mile south from my hotel to the Circuito Magico located in the Parque de la Reserva, just on the other side of the national stadium. I quickly got out of the hub-bub from the Peruvian national women's day celebration parade and started walked and, right when I got to the stadium, I hit an absolute impenetrable wall of humanity.

 

I was able to walk "behind" the stadium where things were much quieter. Well, "quieter" in the sense of "easier to walk." The noise inside the stadium was loud, with speakers and music. (I hit the same wall of humanity on the return walk, only it was not quite as impenetrable because events were still taking place inside. I guessed that it was a Christian event of some sort, given how many people were wearing T-shirts referencing "Jesus." I googled it and found out later that this was Esperanza Lima Festival, a two-day Christian outreach crusade headlined by Christian evangelist Franklin Graham. Which explains why this was the most polite impenetrable wall of humanity I have ever encountered.)

There was even a church service going on simulataneously at a small Catholic church in the shadow of the national stadium, La Parroquia Santa Teresita del Niño Jesús. We Catholics can be indifferent to massive crusades organized by evangelical Protestants.

After that little detour behind the stadium, I arrived at what I surmised was my intended destination.

A wall of humanity, but thankfully not impenetrable. For a mere five soles, about a buck fifty, I was in:

 

Circuito Magico del Agua.

I knew it was fountains lit up in various colors. I knew there was some sort of "show" thrice nightly. But I didn't know the full spectrum of what the place was.

It was an electric night-time carnival, open every night in Lima:

Rides for the kids, such as the well-lit carousel.

And an lit up train to travel the park grounds.

This carriage was stationary, however:

The fountains were awesome. 

There also were these lit-up little cars you could drive around in. Pictures were tough at this point since (a) it was dark, and (b) the cars were moving.

It was this awesome chaos on the walkways, with people walking in the dark on the same walkways with the touring train whizzing by and these people who don't know what they're doing driving these electric plastic cars. And apparently, each night, everybody lives until the next day. Apparently the standards for liability insurance in Peru are different from the United States. At the very least, the rules of liability insurance carriers do not dictate the terms of night-time fun in Lima.

As for the show, I arrived well in advance of the scheduled 8:15 p.m. show.

The show was OK.

I hate to sound like "that kind of tourist," but once you've seen the show at the fountains in front of the Bellagio on the Las Vegas Strip, this was not that impressive. The budget for the Bellagio show is significantly greater than what the City of Lima could afford. So the sound system was not as good. The music was not that loud. The movement of the fountains was not perfectly choreographed to the music. But the lighting with multiple colors definitely outdid the Bellagio.

I will say this in conclusion about the show: The fountains were sufficiently impressive without needing some organized show. I completely enjoyed walking around the fountains and seeing the colors and the water spraying without needing any "show" to make the display more dramatic. The electric carnival atmosphere with beautiful colorful fountains was more than enough entertainment for the night.

And then it was time to walk back to the hotel through the sea of humanity at the national stadium.