Photo Tour: La Pimentel Beach, Peru

On the north coast of Peru, not far south of the border with Ecuador, is the rapidly-growing city of Chiclayo. From there it's easy to catch a bus or a shared-ride van to the town of La Pimentel, at the coast west of Chiclayo.

The wide beach is lined with restaurants, a few places to stay, and -- on summer weekends, at least -- lots of people. During the week, when I was there -- in December, just at the start of summer -- the beach was mostly quiet (and the evenings were dead-quiet; I barely found a place to eat).

Early in the mornings, though, you'll see the fishermen in their traditional boats: caballitos del mar, made of tortora reeds. My room at the municipal hotel and recreation center (a unique place!) looked out over the part of the beach where they launch their boats. That's where we'll start the photo tour -- with a shot framed by the scrubby palm tree that barely survives in this very dry climate.

The bundle of reeds at the left edge of the next photo is probably there for repairs. More than once I saw groups of men and boys working on boats:

Here's the scene early the next morning (or the next...). The last photo shows a man paddling out, alone against the ocean. As you can see, the boats are about the same size as the men:

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(These photographs are Copyright © 2005 by Jerry Peek. Much higher-resolution versions of most images, and many other images too, are available at Jerry Peek Photography. Photos are available at reduced prices, or free, for non-commercial use.)