World Travels coming to an end

It's Thursday at 6:42 pm and we're sitting at the Lex Luthor Hostel in Lima. We left Cusco today at noon and arrived here in Lima at 1:30. Since we have a 12 hour layover, we decided to take a taxi to this hostel to relax instead of spending the endless time in the airport. My biggest concern is taking a taxi back to the airport so late at night (our flight home is at 1:30 am) because of the horrible stories we've heard of taxi drivers and what they do to tourists. Josh went onto Trip Advisor and found a reputable taxi company and hired a driver to pick us up at the airport and take us back tonight. On our drive here, we asked him what has happened to the taxi services here to have such a bad reputation and he explained: Random men will steal cars, place a 'taxi' sign on top of the car, seek out tourists and charge them a cheap price to get where they want to go and then take them to a place where they have a group of others waiting. They then demand money, cameras, passports, anything of value and sometimes beat them to get what they want and leave the tourists stranded. The man we hired, Ronado, was very nice and spoke great English which made me feel better. He has MANY good reviews from other travelers so I trust him to get us back to the airport.

Tonight we plan to watch the Thursday night NFL game at the Corner Sportsbar and then get to the airport to start our flights home. We fly through the night and arrive in Mexico City tomorrow morning. After a 3 hour layover, we fly to Chicago. Josh and I are so excited to get home. These 3 1/2 months have gone by so fast, we've seen so much but we both feel ready to be home. We're ready to be back in the routine of our jobs and in the company of family and friends. This has been a great experience learning about ourselves and each other. We've definitely grown from being gone so long. Thank you to everyone who kept in touch and shared their comments on here and through emails. We look forward to seeing everyone soon!