Buoyed with the promise of Inca gold, Nazca textiles and Moche pots we set off for the Gold Museum.
Now travelling with our preferred taxi service Taxi Movil we arrived at the imposing gates full of anticipation for the treasures within.
An equally imposing sign on the wall told us that we were a hour early. Nothing else for it but an exploration of the leafy suburbs of Monterrico, all nail clipper tended bushes, security guards and electric fences - a 'nice' area.
So nice in fact that we managed to track down some knitting needles that Mum had been searching for - Made in England no less.
A Vermillion Flycatcher perched on a (non electric) wire greeted us when we arrived back at the museum.
The Gold Museum also houses an impressive array of armaments from all over the world.
We were all unprepared though for the opening exhibit, a full size ceremonial sword made in honour of the marriage of Charles & Diana.
It was odd to say the least to find this bit of giant prize British cutlery decaying Camilla-like in the centre of Lima, but better was to come.
In the next display box was a rather attractive inlaid pistol - previous owner Herman Goering. This was going to be a trip to a museum like no other .... actually that's not strictly true, the museum at Akureyri in Iceland came flooding back to me.
That place featured a huge stuffed Polar Bear which had floated down from the North Pole on an ice floe and been rewarded with the local mayor's twelve bore between the eyes, in a side room next to the bear was a display of old calculators and a large card operated adding machine, maybe the museum designer was Peruvian.
Anyway, still smarting from our unexpected contact with the British Monarchy and in search of Inca jewels we moved on.
We were not disappointed as we encountered a couple more cases full of Nazi regalia, Himmler's tie pin, Swastikas and SS weapons making up the gruesome display.
To think I used to dig up our garden as a war obsessed little boy searching for this stuff when it was on the Pacific Coast with the Incas all along - silly me.
Passing another ceremonial sword, this one given as a present to Heile Sellassie of Ethiopia by Queen Elizabeth II, we had yet to find anything Peruvian or Inca, but blimey this place was exceeding all expectations.
More guns, helmets and moth eaten uniforms later I ducked outside into the sun to Esther who was feeding Salvador.
A great opportunity to write some postcards I thought and after careful selection got some half decent ones of Lima, not the most photogenic city on earth.
After completing a card to my sister I took out one of the stamps I had also bought and proceeded to lick the back, no glue, here we go I thought, I checked the rest, equally bereft of glue and of varying denominations that might just have got them to the suburbs of Lima but nowhere near Europe.
As I made my discovery Mum & Dad were just coming back from the same shop clutching more postcards and stamps.
Cue Esther and the return of our money, trying to sell us stamps more ancient than some of the exhibits in the museum next door did not go down at all well
Now for the GOLD.
Tucked away in the basement, the Gold museum itself was the subject of controversy a couple of years ago when the founder died.
His demise sparked a closer inspection which discovered that a high percentage of the exhibits were not gold at all but clever fakes.
This explained why as Mum & Dad's excitement grew when listening to the audio commentary, the reality dashed their illusion.
'In front of you now is one of the most important pieces in the whole museum, an intricate and ornate, gold and silver Inca crown studded with precious stones' when in fact what was on view was a large gap, a small nail and a reference number, the 'original' fake having been removed, pending perhaps an appearance alongside the Polar Bear and calculators on its tour of bizarre museums worldwide.
The 'real' gold on display was impressive though, burial masks, fingernails and a couple of droopy solid gold penis ornaments.
Chas and Di, Nazi memorabilia & precious penises, there really is nothing better than a Saturday morning at a museum in Peru.