Beach house in Pimentel

Rent $500 per week negotiable.

Location Pimentel, Lambayeque, Peru

Contact Maripi Goldman

Phone 407-644-3878 (USA)

Email Maripigoldman@hotmail.com

Located in Pimentel, on Peru’s north coast, 15 minutes from Chiclayo by car and 40 minutes from Lima by plane.

This is a lovely 1500 sq. ft., 2 bedroom 2 ½ bath, plus roof deck house which was completely renovated in 2001. Kitchen, dining, living area and ½ bath are on first floor along with a large patio and adjoining laundry room. The bedrooms, each with private full bath, plus the den and reading area are on second floor. The master bedroom has a direct view of the ocean. The third floor has a roof deck with ocean views.

Daily maid service can be provided for $15 per day (not live in.) She will clean the house and do laundry for you. All meals can be provided at an extra cost of $25 per day, per person.

Pimentel is a lovely beach community that has lots of weekend visitors during the summer (January, February and March) weekends. But it is very quiet and peaceful during the week in the summer and all the time from April to December.

Pimentel started out as a quaint fishing village that grew to become the summer home for wealthy families from Chiclayo and now has year around residents. Our family was the first year around resident.

The beach is wide, 300 feet, and on the outskirts of Pimental you will find some small sand dunes. The middle of town has a pier that people love to fish from.

The nearest city is Chiclayo and it is Peru’s 3rd largest city. There is daily airline service between Lima and Chiclayo. The huge market, Mercado Modelo, is one of the most interesting in Peru because of its “brujo” (witch doctor) stalls with their herbs and dried plants, bones, bits of animals and other healing charms. You can also buy fresh fruits and vegetables here. Chiclayo also has modern supermarkets, movie theatres and casinos.

Pimentel has its own small Mercado a mere 5 minute walk away from this beach house. Here you will find fresh fish, fruits and vegetables as well as meats. There are a few restaurants in Pimentel, one El Pato, is around the corner from our beach house. Its specialty is Peruvian food: cerviche, carne de parilla, and fresh fish for about $5 per person.

Surfing is a year round activity in this area of Peru. An hour away lies Puerto Chicama, a small port famous for its surf and it has the longest left-handed wave in the world. Surfers from around the world go there. About 2 hours away surfing town is Pacasmayo. During our last visit there we had lunch on the boardwalk at an al fresco restaurant and watched American and European surfers.

A 10 minute drive, or a 90 minute walk on the beach, away lies Santa Rosa and San Jose. Both are small fishing villages and it is interesting to watch the men manually haul their fairly large (40 feet long) fishing boats into and out of the ocean.

This area of Peru is known for its small individual fishing boats called “caballitos” (little horses). Fishermen ride on these totora reed boats, hence the name. They were the inspiration for Thor Heyerdahl’s 4,300 mile journey from Peru to Polynesia to prove that the first settlers in the South Pacific were from the Americas.
In fact, he launched his Kon Tiki from the Pimentel beach.

Two other towns are only minutes away, Puerto Eten and Monsefu. Both are worth a visit, especially Monsefu for its handicrafts of basketwork, embroidery and woodwork.

However, most visitors to this area come to see the famous archaeological sites. There are two world class museums within an hour’s drive and both are only a few years old. Some say these are the most impressive museums in all of South America.

The newest opened on August 9, 2003 and is called Royal Tombs of Sipan. It exhibits the most important archaeological remains of the Mochica culture in an exceptional exhibition displaying the jewels, emblems and ornaments found in 1987 in the tomb of a Mochica government leader called the Lord of the Sipan.

The Sican Museum opened in 2002 and holds the artifacts found in two burials within the adobe pyramid of Huaca Loro, in an area better known as Batan Grande, not far from the museum. The culture these artifacts correspond to is known as Sican. The Sican culture developed from 750AD as descendants of the Moche (100-800AD) and predecessors of the later Chimu cultures (100-1400AD). The gold, silver and semi-precious stone artifacts and accessories are beautifully displayed in the museum that has won architectural awards.

Also nearby you will find the 28 pyramids of Tucume and the Brunning Museum with its archaeological artifacts from the Chimu, Moche, Chavin and Vicus cultures.

A day trip will bring you to Chan Chan outside of Peru’s 4th largest city, Trujillo, about 3 hours from Pimentel. Trujillo is a lovely city with a magnificent central plaza. Chan Chan is the huge ruined capital of the Chimu Empire built around 1300AD and covers 9 sq. miles. It is the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas and the largest mud city in the world. Some of its walls reach the height of 25 feet. The Chimu Empire stretched for over 600 miles along the Peruvian coast. They fell to the Incas in the 1476.

You can spend the night in Trujillo and then travel 3 hours south to see Sechin, one of the oldest ruins in the Americas, built in 1600BC. That’s 3,600 years ago! If you do so, then you will probably either want to spend the night in Casma, the nearest city that has one good hotel called El Faro, or you could drive back to Trujillo.

Summer (January-March) is about 80 to 85 degrees farenheit during the day and 70 at night. Breezes from the ocean keep it cool. April – June and October – December are mild, 75 during the day and 65 at night. The winter (July-September) is cool, 65 –70 during the day and 55 –60 at night.

The house comes completely and tastefully furnished with all the necessities you may need, including a TV with over 200 stations.

Pimentel is safe and offers its visitors a chance to savor a life that is far different from the modern day world. In the morning you will wake up to fresh bread being delivered to your door and you can take breakfast on the roof deck overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

Our beach house offers the visitor the chance to relax by the Pacific Ocean, take long walks on the beach to other towns probably without seeing another person on the walk, and eat fresh fish caught by the fishermen on their caballitos. It also offers you a lovely home from which to plan cultural excursions and learn about the pre-Inca cultures.

TESTIMONIAL: "The accommodations were beautiful. The house was everything that you described and more. We were very comfortable and felt great to be in a "home". It was less expensive than staying in a hotel would have been, yet the accommodations were absolutely first class. If we were to travel to the area again, we would certainly do it the exact same way. Everything with the house was wonderful." Prof. Kevin Doyle, Soccer Coach, Creighton University, Omaha, NE on his visit during World Cup September 2005.