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Surf Peru; Penascal Surf Camp Road Trip to Chicama

Posted on 03/01/2009 at 06:52 pm by Nanci Boutet Viewed 10,532 times | 1 comment

November 2008 Peru Surf Trip

Lunar Road

Marc and I went to Peru to meet up with Bill Cannell, a friend from Camden. Bill has been going to Peru for years and has the place wired. He has lots of friends in Lima and the surrounding area. He hooked us up with Surf Penascal Surf Camp in San Bartolo, about an hour south of Lima. There are many good breaks within walking distance of the accommodations, but daily trips are offered.

http://www.surfpenascal.com/

The camp rate was $30 per night per person. All meals were included, and they amazing meals. Antonio Tello and his wife Fiorella are wonderful hosts and they know their stuff. Antonio knows the surf and where to go according to the conditions and Fiorella is a gourmet cook and always keeps her guests well fed. The food was amazing. When we arrived at 11:30 P.M., Antonio was at the airport to meet us with his driver, Archie. We then drove in two vehicles, Marc and I with Archie and Bill Shockley and Erik Eacker of Rhode Island (their second trip to Surf Penascal) drove with Antonio. We were pleasantly surprised to have an uneventful drive to San Bartolo. It seems Archie has a “Cop Magnet” in his car. We slid through the gauntlet without incident. We arrived at camp, checked into our room, 2 twin beds with wonderful thick Peruvian wool blankets. The bathroom was just outside our door. The camp is in a residential area of the beach with a security guard at the entrance to the community.

Courtyard at Surf Penascal

Patio overlooking San Bartolo

Penascal shorefront

 

View of San Bartolo from Surf Penascal. Surfers at Izquierdas "Lefts"

 

Penascal, the break

We took daily trips to different surf spots with Archie and Antonio. Archie always stayed on shore and guarded the gear. When we finished surfing, he packed up all the gear and suits and we were treated like guests. It was a nice touch. When we arrived at Surf Penascal, Archie rinsed our gear, hung our suits on the line and unloaded our boards. Very nice.

Nice doggie at Puerto Viejo

 

Getting ready at Puerto Viejo, a reeling left complete with huge porpoises close enough to touch. 

Archie (check that Limo) Bill and Marc, MiraFlores

 

 

Antonio Tello, Bill Shockley

          
Fiorella, our Gourmet Chef, Lara Raymond, Aussie

A few days, Bill’s friend Carlos Mujica came to pick us up so we could surf with him at his “home break” Punta Roca, at Playa Hermosa (Beautiful Beach). There are several breaks there, some are for experts only. Kon Tikis and Pico Alto only break when it’s big, and Punta Roca shows a swell even when it’s weak. Almost everywhere you go its giant rocks just below the surface. It looks like sandy beach, but the minute you get wet, it’s an obstacle course. Bring REEF BOOTIES! Carlos had the Rad Pad. Super beautiful house in a super beautiful spot. He was an excellent host. We drank Pisco (a fermented grape liqueur) on a few occasions. Carlos has fine taste in Pisco. Whoooeee. Carlos is an exceptional surfer, as are his sons. They were very helpful in showing us hos to paddle out to the lineup. It was tricky, rocks boiling everywhere. Coming back was really hard, as we had paddled out in a cove about 150 meters up the coast, and we had to look for a “yellow house” to bee line toward to come it. Unfortunately there were a couple of “yellow houses” on the way back. Marc is good at recognizing these things and showed me the way, good thing too, my arms were pretty tired.

       

Bill Cannell at Carlos' Playa Hermosa Home

The patio ovelooking KonTiki Surf Break (Small, not working)

 

The view from Carlos' patio accross to Pico Alto

 

Playa Hermosa

Carlos Mujica AKA "Traffa"

 

Carlos, Marc Boutet, Igor, Missy's little butt.

 

Antonio rented a van and seven of us headed for Chicama, hitting several surf spots along the way and staying at different hotels along the road North. The road took us through some amazing mountain sized dunes. Instead of plowing snow, they shovel blowing sand out of the road. It truly looks like the moon. The DVD Lunar Road is so named because of the landscape. There are tons of refineries and chemical plants along the coast north of Lima. The environment is not top on their priorities list. The ocean felt pretty clean everywhere we surfed (Puerto Viejo had little slimy shrimp shells on the bottom which felt yukky, but not polluted).  Antonio fed us well at his little favorite restaurants. We ate WAY too much. WE surfed so many perfect lefts, it’s hard to list them all. Bill took out a “Caballito” a reed boat still used by fishermen. They take these out in big swells. They look hard enough to navigate in small surf, I cannot imagine hanging on to everything in real surf!

 

Bill Shockley with his Caballito Reed Boat

Notice the feet and legs are not "in". They're on. Imagine this in a big swell!

 

Welcome to Chicama

 

This only works with a bigger swell... Chicama. We'll have to go back.

It took 5 days to make the full circle, there was no swell in Chicama, but we could see the setup, and got in for a paddle anyway. We had lunch and a beer at the Hotel Chicama, then decided to do a Museum at Chiclayo, The Lord of Sipán.

Monument to Lord Sipan

We also went to tour a few ruins, Chan Chan and Caral.

 

Ruins at Chan Chan, all related to fishing and the ocean. These designs depict nets.

The ruins at Caral, residents were clled "Caralinas". This is an Amphitheater.

Quite fascinating, as we had no intention of making the trek to Cusco and Macchu Picchu. If you do the Macchu Picchu trip, it takes days in Cusco to acclimate. If you rush it, you get sick. It takes days to recover your equilibrium. A few travelers we met who had suffered from rushing it made me decide it wasn’t worth trying to squeeze it in. That is a trip in itself.
I tried not to go into too much detail, I wanted to share the photos. If you want info, email me an I’ll help in any way I can. Thanks for reading!
Nanci

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