Where Surquillo Begins and Ends
The merits of staying in a less-known neighborhood
In this post, I tell the story of how I came to know Surquillo, a neighborhood that many people visit but few fully appreciate. If you are looking for restaurant recommendations, check my neighborhood guide first.
I started getting to know Surquillo market on my second day in Peru, but it was years before it became my favorite neighborhood to eat in. Surquillo is a great example of how I discover many of my favorite places in Peru—a combination of wanting to make every meal count, rolling with the situation we’re presented with, and old-fashioned obsession.
I wonder if we would’ve been able to discover all of the great places in Surquillo if we hadn’t stayed there for two weeks which allowed us to try a new cevichería every day. We would’ve tried the cevicherías in the market and the ones that trend on Instagram. However, we would have missed gems like Bahaía Fish.
On the other hand, in a lot of ways, Surquillo feels like a neighborhood I was destined to know. My friends and I visited the market on our second morning in Lima where tried tuna juice for the first time—it turns out that they call prickly pear tuna in Peru. We didn’t step a foot into the market that day, but the role of Surquillo market evolved as I got to know Lima better.
On my subsequent trips to Lima, I would always make it a point to visit Surquillo market. For my first several visits, my impressions of Lima were completely different each time. Surquillo market was the one thing that served as an anchoring point that linked all of these disparate impressions to a physical place. After a few visits, I found myself playing tour guide and encouraging fellow travelers who were staying at the same place I was to visit the market. You can find another small story about Surquillo Market here.
Over time, Surquillo from a place of tourist interest to the place where we did our routine weekly shopping. Shopping at markets is rewarding but can be exhausting. Thus, I negotiated with Mariela that we begin each shopping expedition with lunch, a ceviche lunch. Only then, did we start to slowly branch out from the market to the surrounding neighborhood. I didn’t realize how much more of Surquillo there was to discover until we stayed there.
We didn’t intentionally stay in Surquillo. Two and a half years ago, we hadn’t yet settled in an apartment in Lima and were staying in Airbnbs around Lima. We would stay in a different neighborhood each month. However, at some point, we just ended up alternating the obvious neighborhoods of Miraflores and Barranco. Even though we went to the market in Surquillo often, it’s common knowledge that Surquillo is not the safest area to stay in. Many taxi drivers didn’t even want to take us there at night.
We searched for a place in Miraflores and saw a place that looked like it was on the edge of Miraflores, conveniently located near the Surquillo market. However, once we arrived at the Airbnb, we realized it was on the other side of the expressway dividing Miraflores and Surquillo. Even the map pin was inaccurate and showed the apartment as being on the Miraflores side of the expressway. One block does make a difference in Lima, especially at night.
Initially, we were disappointed with the blatant false advertising of our Airbnb which had prominently featured Miraflores in the title. We were able to make the location work for us and discovered an amazing eating neighborhood as a result. However, it doesn’t change the fact that people should be able to make choices of where to stay based on accurate information. Surquillo simply isn’t an ideal neighborhood to stay in for most first-time visitors. If the host wanted to be accurate, they could have easily just advertised it as “one block from Miraflores.”
At each Airbnb we stayed in, we would have lunch everywhere within a fifteen-minute walk which is just enough time for me to be back for my afternoon Zoom calls. Continuing this tradition of visiting every lunch restaurant in the vicinity, we quickly realized that given our love for ceviche, Surquillo was the perfect place to be, at least during the day.
Many visitors consider visiting Surquillo Market the off-the-beaten-path portion of their itinerary, relative to the standard itinerary which revolves around Parque Kennedy, Costa Verde, and Bohemian Barranco. However, they visit the market and stop there. The market is only the beginning. Staying in Surquillo allowed us to see Surquillo beyond the market.
Why is Surquillo such a gastronomic hotspot? First, there’s the fact that it has great access to fresh ingredients. I’ve asked a couple of chefs and I think a lot of it has to do with the relatively low cost of rent and the ease of opening a restaurant there.
For me, a lot of the appeal of Surquillo is how unflashy it is. Many cevicherías in Surquillo don’t advertise their name. You essentially just walk by a building and see people eating. It took months before Cumpa, now one of Surquillo’s most popular restaurant, made it onto Google Maps. The interiors are generally sparsely decorated, and the kitchens tend to look more like the set-up for a catering service than a full restaurant kitchen.
We have since settled into an apartment in Lima, and Surquillo is only a ten-minute drive to our apartment without traffic. However, we’ve found that there’s a huge difference between already being somewhere versus having to plan each visit deliberately. For us, it was the difference between being able to visit a dozen or two cevicherías a neighborhood over a couple of weeks versus visiting a couple of places over several months.
Looking back at our travels, we now realize that we prefer to be away from destination neighborhoods as long as the area is walkable and safe. By the definition, you’ll naturally gravitate toward the destination neighborhoods. If you only have three or four days, by all means, stay in the center. For longer-term stays, I recommend trying a lesser-known neighborhood which allows you discover other things you probably won’t otherwise.
We’ve discovered some of our favorite spots around the world by staying in less popular neighborhoods. Just a few examples … in a suburb of Florence, I discovered a charming wine shop run by a couple who introduced me to natural wines without the pretense. We’ve been to Cancun twice now for weeklong stays but have yet to set foot in the hotel zone. Last time, we essentially had a private beach and were next to a restaurant where you could feel the sand under your feet while feasting on exquisite whole fish. In Panama City, we woke up to a view of boats heading to the canal. A lot of times when we’d tell other visitors where we were staying, the response would be, “I didn’t know you could stay there!”