You are here: Our Blog

USA TODAY PRAISES LIMA AS BIGGEST TOURIST SURPRISE OF 2011

By Andina

(01/06/2012)USA Today online version awarded the city of Lima with the Biggest Surprise award saying it is a destination that surpasses expectations, with its architectural heritage and its exquisite gastronomy.

In the “Travel” section of said website –which is one of the most visited in the United States- journalist Chris Gray Faust expressed great satisfaction after walking the streets of Downtown Lima.

The article titled “2011 in Review: Biggest Surprise (Lima, Peru),” the journalist praised the beauty of the wooden Moorish-influenced balconies that make the city center an Unesco World Heritage site.

Gray noted that both the Lima Cathedral, which houses the tomb of Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro and the Monastery of San Francisco, with bones piled high in its catacombs, were historic sites as worthy as any you’d find in more well-known tourist spots.

Later, the journalist ate at a restaurant owned by Peru’s celebrity chef, Gastón Acurio, drinking pisco sours while the city’s chic set drifted by in their beachy best.

His 18 hour stay in Lima ended with an eyeful of erotic pre-Columbian pottery collection at Museo Larco.

“All too soon, I got on my plane – and plotted when I could come back. I’m not saying that Lima is perfect – you do need to take safety precautions, as I mentioned – but the city certainly made me realize that Peru contains many stops beyond the tried-and-true tourist trail that are worth exploring,” noted Gray.

USA Today is a national American daily newspaper which vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003.