Lima, Dec 30 (EFE).- This capital’s La Pampilla beach has become the first in Peru with night-time lighting, an improvement the municipal government says is aimed at encouraging the country’s world-class surfers to extend their activity past sunset.
Starting this week, 1,000-watt LED lights atop four posts 18 meters (59 ft) high will illuminate the shoreline in the Lima district of Miraflores.
The lighted beach will be a tourist attraction as well as a magnet for surfers, city project coordinator Humberto Guzman told EFE.
In August, the Peruvian team won the International Surfing Association championship in Costa Rica, their third world title in six years.
Lima Mayor Luis Castañeda reached out to Peru’s surfing federation for guidance on the initiative and to arrange a night-surfing meet on La Pampilla, Guzman said.
Surfer Omar Bedoya, who is a regular at La Pampilla, told EFE that the illumination “is a good idea because it extends the hours we can be on the water.”
“I surf every chance I get, almost every day, and I try to come to the beach as many times as I can every day,” Bedoya said.
Surfers who usually ride the waves early in the day returned to La Pampilla late Thursday to sample the new conditions. Though the waves were small, the relative lack of bathers gave them more room.