Blueberry Compote #HotLips

Dancing queen #Move&Groove

I don't get out and about with Fingerling in quite the same way as I used to with Small Fry. He got baby singing at least twice a week for a whole year, amongst other try-outs such as Baby Gymboree or a motor skills class or two. It's mostly just a problem of trying to juggle the time of the class with Small Fry's pick-up time from the garderie.

On Monday we had to cross Paris all the way to the 5th, which is thankfully possibly due to a direct bus from our local train station, and so we got to our first dedicated Baby Move and Groove class just for Fingerling. And she totally loved it. She was awake and alert, she participated, she touched things and looked at herself in the mirror and somersaulted and was thrown in the air and played musical statues and came away suitably exhausted (win-win all round). 

Yesterday I caught her on camera dancing along to a little tune that I put on to try and learn the words as Small Fry came home from the garderie singing it.

The attraction of the pedalling ankle #FirstWord

Fingerling has been doing this leg movement since she was just a few weeks old. Today she combined it with her first word :)

Shadowlands #ClosedShuttersToKeepCool

It's routine, routine, routine here. The days blend in to each other as we do our metro boulot dodo thing (the French version of work, play, eat, sleep). Which is not such a bad thing as a) we didn't have a routine for a couple of weeks during our holidays and so I'm happy things are settling back to normal, and b) both Small Fry and Fingerling are getting new beds this weekend, which is likely to disrupt things once more.

Park Life #TheWeekThatWas

There's been few April showers this year; instead we've been basking in temperatures of 26 degrees. Maybe for that reason - or because we beat the post-school-rush, but Small Fry was the Lone Ranger on the carousel today...twice.

I don't think the random warm termperatures can speed up hatching or suddenly multiply broods, but this duck has 12 little ducklings following her....the first we've seen this year. Maybe as it's so warm we're just seeing them out and about more and maybe more survive the nights? Anyone out there a duck expert?

Small Fry has come down with a 'summer cold'. He's sneezing and snotting his way through each day. Earlier he told me that he had 'mal au bidon' (a sore tummy). So I got the sick bowl out, but something led me to suspect it was more a case of practising his vocabulary/garnering sympathy than a true case of the voms.

And here is Fingerling's money shot: in her summer headscarf on her morning constitutional...in the park again...

Family Album #Peru

It's funny to think I have family in Peru. And if it wasn't for them I can't see myself having got to Peru otherwise, and certainly not 3 times in 3 years. Pretty much this alone made the whole trip worth it:

98 years and 10cm of difference

Although it was Small Fry who made such a grand entrance, we all felt a bit sick when we arrived in Lima: a combination of a lack of sleep, a 6 hour flight, a 2-hour time difference, the heat, humidity and no air.  Lima itself is the third largest city in the Americas by population (with almost 10 million in the metropolitan area). The city is situation on the shores of the Pacific Ocean and the urban area covers around 60km from north to south and 30km from east to west. The city slopes from the flat Peruvian coastal plain to the mountain slopes of the Andes. Within the city there are isolated hills but they are brown and dusty as Lima is the world's second largest desert city after Cairo in Egypt. Apart from the upscale areas such as Miraflores to the south of the city, there is really very little visible vegetation, at least on the hills). We always stay with Mamita in Los Olivos, around 14km north of the historical centre, where it was hot and humid and not very breezy. That was mostly the fault of the neighbours whose ongoing construction is right beside the house, blocking the wind but not the sun.

The view from the roof towards the barren hills that separate Los Olivos from the centre of Lima.

The neighbour's building works (in brick) and mamita's terrace wall in white

The neighbour's covered backyard

It was Small Fry though that saw us head off to the pediatrician on our first night in Peru. It wasn't actually the diarrhea or vomiting, but some nasty bites that got us worried. Small Fry is our little bug magnet, and although he ended up with over 30 bites, 3 of them turned into swollen purple bruises that looked a bit menacing. He also had a nasty bite right beside his eye, which had forced it almost shut. Here he is a bit later in the holiday watching telly in a hotel room, but you can still see the bites:

We got some medicine and within a few days Small Fry was feeling much better and eating well, as is his habit. I can't say the same for his behaviour though. Mr centre-of-attention-Small-Fry used every ploy in the book to stay up late, sleep in mama and papa's bed, be carried, eat what he wanted (chips, because they seemed to come with every meal we ate out), push the buggy, swat away incoming kisses, run in the opposite direction when called, and roar back 'nooooooo-aaaa' with cross eyebrows when asked to do something he didn't want to.

We were partly to blame for a few of the problems because we really, really wanted the kids to sleep at helpful times - like the night, and naps - so they often joined us in our bed. Honestly, I've been obsessed with their sleep schedules for almost 3 weeks now. Illness, jetlag, travel and underhand strategies left us needing a lie down, but not always the kiddies. It's the only reason I can think of that I have so many photos of us in bed or babies sleeping.

We're wide awake!

Not.At.All.Tired.

Will they sleep?

Fooled ya.

This is not going the way I want it to.

Could have predicted this.

And finally this.

Hands down the best outcome...for them. One nursing one side and the other tucked up against mama the other side in a sweaty, sticky nap. 

Mama extricates herself. Heads for a shower.

Even back home I can't stop taking photos of sleeping babies. Note, this is not Small Fry's bed. And this was not a conducive sleeping position for us.

After a few days of readjustment to both the time zone and the temperature, we were feeling much better and so braved some more travel. This time with the 7 of us (4 generations) across 3 rows in one car with mediocre air conditioning and not a lot of leg room.

When you live in north Lima and are heading south along the coast, the first obstacle is to cross the city. Traffic in Lima is a little bit chaotic, mostly due to a skeleton pubilc transport system, high volume of traffic and few road rules or enforcement. Add in a car/bus/truck or two breaking down or a snarled major junction and even the swifter arterial routes can come to a grinding halt. This time we did not too badly and were in the southern burbs 1.5 hours later...round about the time we all needed lunch.

So we stopped off in San Bartolo. As it's a seaside resort town in southern Lima province, it attracts a lot of tourists, particularly surfers. And that's about all I found out about it as we wanted to push on further southwards. I did see a lot of new appartments and modern housing complexes, so it looks like things are going well on that front.

We finally stopped at Paracas, a small port town in the province of Pisco, which caters primarily to tourists (white ones) around 260km south of Lima. It serves as the jumping point for tours to Paracas National Reservation where there are numerous birds and sealions, but we decided not to brave the boat with two wee ones (and especially once we saw the colour of the Europeans coming back after a day in the sun on a boat with not enough sun protection). Paracas is now a major beach resort in Peru and we found a hotel along the newly rebuilt hotel strip (the old hotels were devastated by an 8.0 magnitude earthquake that hit the central coast of Peru in 2007).

The bungalow that we took for 2 nights care with some modern and some more traditional features: a maid's room, fans (no aircon), a pool, an excellent restaurant, and the odd cockroach or two in the kitchen.

Enjoying breakfast on the hotel terrace

The pool (25 degrees: warmer than the sea but colder than your average swimming pool)

Along the beachfront at Paracas

The view from the hotel strip at dusk

The local wildlife

Pisco is a colourless or yellowish-to-amber coloured brandy, produced in wine-making regions of Peru and Chile. It is created by distilling grape vine into a high-proof spirit. Annual production is now around 7.2 million litres in Peru, of which we took a few. Peru currently exports three times more Pisco than Chile. It is made using only copper pot stills, like single malt Scotch whiskies, rather than continuous stills like most vodkas. Pisco sour is a cocktail using pisco and mixed with egg white, lime juice, simple syrup and bitters. Totally refreshing after a hard day trying to get Small Fry to do what we want him to do.

A couple of nights and piscos later, we were feeling much refreshed and travelled further south to Ica, around 300km from Lima. The city suffered extensive damage and loss of life in the 2007 earthquake, although you would never have known from what we saw. We were staying on the outskirts of Ica in a beautiful hacienda-style hotel and tried to 'pop' into Ica for dinner. The place was absolutely heaving and we could hardly reach the main square due to the sheer volume of traffic and people. It was Holy Week and the start of the 4-day Easter weekend. We ended up not being able to find any parking and so ate in the hotel restaurant, which was catering to 5 families the night we were there and an expected 100 additional guests the following night.

The pool in Ica

Chillaxing

Looking towards the sand dunes that surround Ica

Ica's location in the desert provides truly unique opportunities for tourism. Huacachina is a small village in the dunes around Ica, resting beside a small natural oasis. Over recent years it has become quite a tourist destination, drawing both local and international tourists to try their hand at sandboarding and dune buggy riding on sand dunes that stretch several hundred feet high.

I swear I had absolutely no intention of doing either of them. We were due to travel from Ica back to Lima, and just wanted to see Huacachina as the dunes are really quite incredible and accessible. El Puma had been trying to convince me about sandboarding but I remained steadfastly skeptical, mainly because it sounded like hot and hard work, but also because it was going to interfere massively with the babies' routines.

Anyway, of course we got there and I saw a dune buggy and said out loud, that looks like a lot of fun, which of course was like lighting a match and within an hour, we were on one (for the bargain price of about £10 for the hour).  

Not all of us obviously. We left Mamita, la Moz and a sleeping Fingerling under the shady garden canopies of a well situated Backpacker's. But we took Small Fry. I honestly don't know what we were thinking. It's probably just because we've done everything with him this holiday, but also I don't think I appreciated how bumpy sand is, nor how hot it is in the dunes, nor how scary a big revving beast like a dune buggy can be.

We accelerated rapidly up into the dunes and flew across the plateau, along ridges and down stomach-churning drops until we reached a section where everyone stopped for pictures. Hence, a picture:

A panorama of the dunes

It was also the spot for sandboarding, and seeing as we were there and the boards were attached to the back, I relented and decided to give it a go. Sandboarding can be similar to snowboarding, but snowboarding it pretty difficult the first couple of times you try it, and falling into hot sand face first is not that desirable (neither into cold snow but it's still more bearable). In order to make it more accessible, they encourage you to lie flat on the board, tuck in your elbows and knees and hold on to the foot bindings. And away you go. Friction is substantially higher than on snow so you need a good slope to really get some speed up.

No pommels here. Nothing for it but to hike back up.

It was really a lot, lot of fun and I would happily try it again. Unfortuantely for Small Fry, it started to just get all a bit too much and he didn't want to get back in the buggy. We were miles from anywhere in the middle of the dunes in the blazing sunshine and reflected heat so we had zero options. We stuffed him back in the buggy and roared and bumped our way back to the oasis. We asked the driver to go slowly and carefully in order to reduce SF's fear, and I suppose he did because we skipped the cornering and just bombed across the plateau, but he still cried the whole way home anyway.

I was immensely proud of him as it was a big ask for a little boy (and we hadn't even asked him), and as soon as he was on solid ground he gabbled on about how the voiture went doucement and vite voooom (the car went slow and fast) so it obviously made quite an impression. From there we made a beeline for Lima and arrived after dark, but having enjoyed an adventurous little trip overall.

On our final couple of days in Lima we caught up with extended family and friends. This little girl (Maria-José) is Small Fry's third cousin, and therefore the same relation to SF as his third cousin on the other side. This little blue-eyed beauty normally lives in Spain, but her Peruvian mother is the daughter of one of Le Poz's cousins (Magda) and they were back home at the same time as us visiting their family. 

Small Fry with Magda in 2012

Le Poz and La Moz also became godparents to Samanda, below with her mama. Her dad Javier sorted out the hire cars for us and they've known El Puma's parents for a long time.

We celebrated Easter on our last day in Lima, trekking over 20km across the city to get to an English-speaking Church service, but only after Small Fry had collected his hand-painted eggs hidden in the various flowerpots and trees in the garden.

Real eggs for him

Chocolate milk for her

And if you're still reading this, then I am very impressed. And so I'll finish where I began: My family in Peru.

Fingerling fistbumps her mamita

3 words for 3 years #ILoveYou

Shadows of our former selves

3 years down. Forever to go!

Brazil #Epic

I hate flying. Well, I sort of hate flying. I don't actually mind the going up and down bit or the hanging around in airports or anything. And I have full confidence in a plane structurally and the aerodynamics that makes it fly. But I don't like the air in a plane, how it makes me thirsty and dry, gives me a sore throat and mucks up my digestion for a day or two. Or how there are often good films but you can't hear them unless you turn up the volume until it hurts*, and they keep getting interrupted by announcements (and now children) anyway. And I really don't like how they keep crashing. I guess the problem with being on holiday when you hear about a downed aeroplane, especially one like Germanwings, is that you still need to take flights to get back home. El Puma says it's because I'm not in control. So maybe that's my higher career calling...

 * Problem solved for Small Fry at least:

Flying is a necessary means to a wonderful end I suppose (hopefully not that kind of end). And I can think of one advantage of flying with a 2 year old: he's not been jaded by all of the above and still finds it to be altogether quite an adventure. And our holiday to Brazil and Peru was wonderful. In a word: epic. You can always tell how someone's holiday will be from the luggage I reckon:

Epic

Rio de Janeiro is an absolutely fantastic city. It's one of those places that was on my To Do list, but pretty far down as I just never thought I would actually get there. I had the same feeling when I saw the Sydney Opera House way back last century. It's kind of a bit of a shock that you are actually there. 

Rio de Janeiro (January River) is the second largest city in Brazil (6.5 million), the sixth in the Americas and the thirty-fifth in the world, by population. It was founded in 1565 by the Portugese and is now one of the southern hemisphere's most visited cities, famous for its natural beauty, the samba, bossa nova, its beaches such as Copacabana and famous landmarks including the statue of Christ the Redeemer and Sugarloaf mountain.

We rented an airbnb appartment, which is the first time we've done that. It was perfect for our needs - situated just a couple of hundred metres from the family-friendly Ipanema beach, with the metro right outside as well as food shops, bars, a park and the lake, alongside lovely tree-lined streets (shade!). And we could all be together and Small Fry had plenty of space to run around in and Fingerling had plenty of space to practise her rolling. And it had aircon.

Our first day's activity was to visit Sugarloaf mountain, which is so named as it resembles concentrated refined loaf sugar and sticks 400m out of the ocean, accessible only by cable car (or rock climbing....so really only by cable car).

The Italian-made cable car

The Sugarloaf idea

Copacabana Beach

Not so family-friendly Ipanema beach on our first day

It was really a one-activity-a-day kind of holiday with our two little kiddies, so the following day we headed for Corcovado, meaning hunchback in Portugese. Yes, the mountain again...(and apparently also rock-climbable). And on top of that mountain is the 38m Christ the Redeemer statue. Which Small Fry does a great impression of:

Which is just as well, as this is what we saw when we arrived: 

 It did improve though...

 ...and we got our shots...

Looking towards Ipanema: the strip of land sandwiched between the sea and the lake

A better evening at the beach

And on our final full day in Brazil we stayed local and visited the lake, and packed, and found out that Abuelo had received his passport and would be joining us in Peru...

Sheltering from the sun beside the lake

Toys laid out under a tree by a man selling and slicing coconuts for anyone who wanted to make use of the toys (and drink coconut milk)

Our final evening at the beach

My golden girl with the big fat mozzie bite on his cheek

We even got a special treat: 1 hour to ourselves! while La Moz babysat. So here we were at this trendy little open air terrace bar, giggling about the Brazilian woman a table away who looked, um, to be a bit too big-boned to be a woman. Until she turned around and chatted us up...in French (possibly only one of us, but we're not actually sure whom). So it goes to show, in this multi-cultural, multi-lingual world, never ever assume that someone won't understand you! 

I don't think she heard us, but we learnt our lesson.

Rio is a fun city, and of course we were the ones silly enough to visit it in 2015 - a year after the football World Cup and a year before the Olympics. But it was still amazing. And it was totally by chance. The cheapest flights on the day we booked went through Rio, but a week or so earlier it was New Orleans, and a couple of weeks before that it was Cancun, and a couple of weeks before that it was Miami, and a couple of weeks....etc (we took a while to book). But the flight we got between Rio and Lima is the whole reason why our ticket was so cheap I reckon. It left at 05h30, which meant getting to the airport at 03h30, which meant leaving at 02h30, which meant getting up at 01h45 for our 6 hour flight, and a 2-hour time difference. All this after a feijoada, a traditional stew of beans, beef and pork from a local restaurant.

The first signs of trouble came after check-in at the airport in Rio. After finishing up our 4am coffee, Small Fry went pale, very quiet and then cried loudly, walking like a penguin but wanting to be carried. He had created the most putrid nappy I have ever seen. It was so full and heavy that he couldn't walk properly, and so sore that he wailed. It was foul and I only just saved it from leaking out onto his trousers. The second time, by now in the air, we weren't so lucky. But, fair is fair and it was now El Puma's turn. And that is how Small Fry arrived in Peru without any trousers on. He traipsed along, wagging his nappy-clad bottom with his toddler walk. El Puma picked him up to pass through passport control.

Hola, said the immigration officer.

Bleurk went Small Fry, vomiting all over himself, El Puma, La Moz and the floor. Pulling out the baby wipes, I knelt down at the feet of Peruvian immigration, wiping vomit off her desk and booth, and thought to myself again, yes, I hate flying.