Ceviche Cart, Corn Dog Cart, Churro Cart: I Picked Two

I walk out of the shopping mall next to my hotel and what beckons? The ceviche cart!

Last day in Lima. Last day in Peru. The day to head back home. Very little actual tourism-ing ever gets done on these last days of vacation travel. And today was not exception.

I hung out in the mall next to my hotel. For the third time in my Latin American travel adventures something happened that makes me very very feliz. I was in the large grocery store and a employee comes up to me speaking Spanish. It's a Spanish-speaking country, so this is to be expected. I respond with my standard: "no puedo hablar muy bien." Translation: I can't speak Spanish very well. And he responds with a question: "Brasil?" I think I look like the prototypical gringo viejo, but I do speak Spanish with a bit of a "sotaque brasileiro," but not enough I would think to be mistaken for anything other than un turista de los estados unidos. It makes me so happy that, although my Spanish is terrible, my Brazilian accent is convincing.

I then went to the park, Parque Juana Alarco de Dammert and immediately was greeted by the ceviche cart. Raw fish + hot tropical sun + street cart with no refrigeration? What could possibly go wrong!

 

I shot a picture of this tree because I think it's interesting looking. When I ask a local, they just say it's a pine. We have pine trees where I came from and our pine trees do not look like this.

Oh well. Mystery to be solved in some later trip.

And here's another ceviche cart in this one park:

Apparently they do enough business that's there's enough trade for more than one cart. Which bodes well for the ceviche. High turnover of the merchandise reduces the chances of stomach distress. But it only reduces it. And I got 12 hours of flying time coming up.

And here's that same species of tree, standing alone:

I was thinking that I could be tempted by the corn dog cart. I saw the corn dog carted a few days ago and the cart had, among other flavors, nacho cheese Doritos flavored corn dogs. I was intrigued. But I did not pull the trigger on my Doritos nacho cheese corn dog that night and the cart was not there. I looked around and the cart was not back today. Oh well, Next time. I thought.

Then:

She came wheeling past me, into the park, to set up business. Apparently there is room for a single corn dog cart in a world of unrefrigerated ceviche carts.

What to do. I also knew there was a street cart selling Peruvian churros (filled with manjar blanco!) across the street from the park. I decided to eat at two of the three carts. Which two? Ceviche? Corn dog? Churro?

The churro was a no-brainer. But the churro was dessert. For the main course, I selected:

The corn dog cart! Only she did not have the nacho cheese Dorito corn dogs today. I snoozed and I losed on that front. So I had the papas flavor, a corn dog studded with french fry bits (sort of like those shoestring potatoes that come in a can, only shorter in length). The corn dog also had ample amounts of gooey cheese at each end. Sauce? BBQ, of course.

The ceviche cart will have to wait for another day.