Nazca Lines - Peru

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Our return to Lima was kept brief, as we spent just the one night there before catching a bus early the following morning for Nazca. The 9 hour journey down to Nazca didn´t run too smoothly. After 6 hours of seriously erratic driving through a largely barren landscape, the bus pulled over, the driver jumped out along with a couple of ransoms and started fiddling with the rear back wheel. Not exactly being mechanically minded, I couldn’t make out what the were trying to do, but after a few frustrating hours of guessing what the problem was and whether we’d ever actually make it to Nazca, the problem seemed to be resolved using a wedge shaped piece of wood found by the roadside (answers on a postcard). We rocked up in the largely unremarkable, dusty town of Nazca around 3pm in the afternoon and after checking in to the Hotel Marinas (nice enough) we set about organizing a flight over the Nazca lines, the sole reason for our visit to this desolate place.

The Nazca lines spread over some 500 sq km of dusty plains, and consist of a network of over 300 figures, depicting drawings ranging from a 90m long monkey to a giant Condor with a wingspan over 130m. The lines were created by removing the sun darkened stones from the desert surface, exposing the lighter stones below. However, the reason for their construction remains a complete mystery, not least, because they’re form can only really be appreciated from the air, something which the ancient Nazcas, some 2000 years ago, could never have witnessed. Some have suggested that the lines represent a complex astronomical calendar, while others (an American) have proposed that they are a sign of extra terrestrial life! Whatever your opinion, they still make for an impressive sight.

We arranged our 25 min flight over the lines for the following morning at 8am. Our plane, a 6 person Cessna, looked more like a model aero plane then anything else and we were both a little apprehensive. Needless to say the flight went ok, despite being a little bumpy and feeling a little sick at times (you’d circle over the figures in one direction and then go back round the opposite way, …not good!). The lines were quite impressive (though not as distinct as we´d expected) and the mind boggles at how they were formed on the ground without any instruction from someone with a bird’s eye view (I think they must have made platforms) and the Monkey was definitely the pick of the bunch.

After the flight, we returned to the hotel, grabbed a spot of breaky and then caught a bus back to Lima, arriving around 7pm. We returned back to the Albergue Juvenil International and basically just caught up on some much needed sleep before catching a flight to Sao Paulo the following evening….or at least so we thought!!!


Just a quick note about the photos: We´ve seen the lines, we know what they look like, and we still can´t see them on the photos and so you´ll be excused for thinking theres nothing there!

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