The best place to eat dinner. Located about 10 minutes from Pucallpa in Yarinacocha.
Taco Tuesday!!! As has become the tradition of late, we took a few hours off on Tuesday to take care of things outside the house.
Kelly's Tio Jesus helped her mom prepare this absolutely delicious dish for us, sorry to any Ceviche snobs out there, we left the lettuce out. For those not familiar with Ceviche, it originated in Peru. Sorry Inca Cola, we had Coca-Cola this time!
Almost every city in Peru has a Plaza de Armas or main square. This dates back to the colonial time of the Spanish Conquistadors.
Expatriates in Peru is the best place on Facebook to talk about Peru. They recently added their 1,000th member. It was started by a fellow expat in September of 2009 and continues to grow and thrive. There are lots of new posts everyday and hundreds of comments that go along with them. The group is very active!
It is an excellent place for people to get timely answers to any questions they might have about Peru, network, make new friends and share information and ideas. The group is open to anyone interested in Peru. It is an extremely diverse group and many of the members get together on a fairly regular basis to have a good time. Most of the members live in Peru, so getting accurate accurate information based on experience is the norm.
If you are interested in checking out the group, click HERE.
Click HERE to read another great story about the Expatriates in Peru Group.
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Yesterday a lot of the internet went symbolically dark to protest Hollywood’s attempt to hijack the internet, this site included. Thank you for your patience. If you live in the US please contact your legislators. Outside the US, please contact the US State Department. http://sopastrike.com/. Please remain vigilant, they will try make some cosmetic changes to the bills and push them through. Remember too, this is a bi-partisan issue with ill informed and technically illiterate politicians trying to push through bills with the aid of their lobbyists.
Yesterday we went to the Pucallpa Zoo for the first time since we moved back to Peru in 2009. I have very personal ties to the zoo. In 1999 I donated my zoo in Pucallpa consisting of over 100 mammals and reptiles plus about 100 or so birds to the Pucallpa Zoo. They still had quite a few of them in 2003, the last time I visited the zoo but not anymore. Back to the visit… Kelly, Mama Rosa and I all hopped into a motokar and headed off to the zoo. From the center of the city expect to pay 3 or 4 soles to get there. Make sure you and the driver agree you will be taken to then entrance of the park. The zoo is located at km4.2 on the Carretera Federico Basadre LINK. Once you turn off the highway it is still another kilometer to the zoo. The last bit of the road is a muddy nightmare during the rainy season. Currently the zoo is in a state of chaos, which in this case, is a good thing. They were awarded about 6 million soles(over US$2 million) to upgrade and repair the zoo. There is ongoing construction in almost every portion of the park. The zoo has a long and storied past, it has seen it good times and bad, right now times are great!
The entrance fee is S/. 3.00(about US$1.20) for adults and 1 sol for students. Like everywhere else in Peru, make sure you are prepared. Bring a camera! You never know what you are going to see. Also take insect repellent, sunscreen, toilet paper and some snacks. Oh, and it being the rainy season, bring an umbrella, just in case! I posted a map of the zoo. As the map says, ‘use it to locate your favorite animal.’ You can expect to spend about 3 hours exploring the zoo, snacking and enjoying the beauty of the park. Enjoy the photos and I will be posting more on Facebook.
We were walking along when Kelly spotted the most colorful and beautiful caterpillar we had ever seen. And yes, it does have a tail.
This is a vulture, believe it or not:
An Ocelot having a nap:
Spider Monkeys or maquisapa as they are known here having a good time:
Wooley Monkeys or Mono Choro as they are known here:

I am a nerd and while going through my news updates today I came across an interesting article on noise pollution and how a new application called NoiseTube was being used to track it. The app works with either iOS or Android devices. I downloaded the Android version and will start monitoring noise around Pucallpa and report back. So, do your part! Download this and help track the noise in your neighborhood, be it in Peru or elsewhere in the world.
Why bother? The noise here is one of the few things that really bothers me and is out of my control. Now I have a tremendously useful tool to measure it. Interested, check out the article on mashable.
http://mashable.com/2012/01/11/noisetube-noise-pollution/
“We live in very, very loud world. With cars whizzing past, construction sites pounding away, ambulances roaring around and the dull ache of idle chatter constantly bombarding the sound wall, it’s easy to get overwhelmed in a noisy environment. And there’s good reason for that: Although it’s usually pushed into the background, noise is actually a form of pollution.”
Happy New Year! Thanks for making 2011 a record year for the site. All advertisement free. The blog will celebrate it’s 3rd anniversary in July 2012. At that time I will be making some major changes to the site. My site has been verified by SiteLock. I will be adding that to the site soon. What does that mean? It means my server and site are free of viruses and adware/spyware and much much more.
Have a Safe, Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year!
Scott