Paracas, Ica, Nasca and Colca Canyon

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So I have had a very hectic week, but its been great! I met my tour group. There are 12 of us, all around my age and from either the UK, Oz, Canada or the USA. We all seem to be getting on great and I think that there will be many funny moments ahead for us all!

After departing to Lima we headed south to Paracas, another costal town. Very small and quiet and still recovering from the earthquake that hit Peru a couple of years ago. From Paracas you can take boat trips to the Ballestas Islands but having been to the Galapagos I decided to give this a miss. That afternoon though we headed to a vineyard where they specialise in making the local spirit called Pisco and some wines and could indulge in some tasting sessions. After this we headed into the sand dunes of the Atacama desert to ride in some sand buggies and do some sand boarding. This was an amazing experience and it was great! The sand however was really hot and it felt like our skin was burning when we touched it but that didnt stop us having a great laugh sliding down almost vertical sand dunes! After about 1hr 1/2 we headed back to the village where we splashed about in a pool and chilled before heading to Nasca.

Nasca is famous for the Nasca lines. Carvings in the ground that are over 2000yrs old carved by the Nasca civilisation purely on geometry. We had the option to fly over them which I decided to do along with a few others (regardless of all the bad safety standards and crashes that we had heard about!). We flew in a little cesna light aircraft which wobbled quite a bit in the sky and made my stomach feel very unsettled! The lines actually appeared quite small from the sky and you did have to concentrate to see many of them. It was also very difficult to take pictures of them but I think between the group of us we had about one decent picture of each of the main lines. After 30minutes in the sky I was very pleased to be standing back on the ground and let my stomach settle a bit! All in all though a great experience! Once again we had the luxury of a pool at our hostel so we made the most of the sunshine and the pool.

That night we then took an overnight bus to Arequipa. Arequipa is Peru´s second most important city with a population of about 1million. We had a day to explore the town and a night out in the bar´s before we headed of to the Colca Canyon.

The Colca Canyon is considerd one of the worlds deepest canyon´s at 3191m and is a popular place to spot condors. Whilst we were in the area we did a couple of treks and spent some time spotting condors. This was a beautiful place but was very different to Huaraz....hopefully my pictures can show this! Also in the Colca area were some natural hot springs which we felt obliged to try. These went own a treat and were very relaxing.

Next up for us now though is the overnight bus to Cusco where we will be doing the Inc trial at the weekend. We are all very excited!

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Photos

Before take off
To fly over the Nasca lines

Comments

[Daphne Jay]

Paracas, Ica, Nasca and Colca Canyon
Hi Charity, It all sounds great. Glad you are with a good bunch of friends. Hope you can manage to get the pictures on, am really looking forward to seeing them. Take care Daphne.