The last day of the year began by catching a ridiculously old and small taxi to get to the bus station. We took a 3-hour ride to the town of Pacasmayo. When we arrived it looked quite cute and colorful. Much tidier and calmer compared to Mancora.
We went to our beachfront hostel and got (un)expected news of the day. The town government has closed the beach for 2 days. There was a big Christmas party on the beach that the government didn’t like so they decided to ban the beach altogether.
In the evening we went to see the last sunset of the year. The boardwalk next to the beach was opened while the beach itself was guarded by police and military. The fact that there were soldiers with rifles who stood there to stop people from going to the beach was both intimidating and silly at the same time.🪖. I guess we’ll be ending 2021 with the same note as it began.
With midnight approaching the central square and restaurants were calm. We unexpectedly found crowds of people in the market streets still making last-second purchases. Many vendors were selling tamales, a local dish wrapped in a banana leaf. It looked to be a thing to buy and eat during the new year celebration. Others were selling grapes, Peru sharing the same tradition as we saw in Spain of eating grapes at midnight. We also noticed a disproportionate amount of people wearing yellow clothes and accessories. Those who didn’t wear it were still trying to buy some yellow underwear or at least a necklace at 10 PM as people believe it attracts luck and riches 🟡.
Midnight came with people leaving their homes and lighting up fireworks. We lifted the glasses with champagne to what has been a great ending to the memorable year hoping for even more adventures to come in 2022 🥂.