We arrived in Ica and had an hour before our first activity, dunebuggying. The thing that never ceases to amaze me about Peru is that it’s a small country with so many geographical points: rainforest, mountains, desert, sand dunes, coastline, and so on.
Back to dune buggying. I think this is the coolest thing I have ever done in my ENTIRE life. The sand dunes in Ica are like Sleeping Bear Dunes in Michigan times a million. Everyone traveled on 4-wheeler-type things and there were 5 to 10 of us on each one. We had to be strapped in by putting our arms through belts and it clicked in the middle. We started going really fast over the first sand dune and then for miles all you could see was dunes. We went really fast over small ones and big ones and sometimes had sudden drops. It was like being on a roller coaster.
I'm the one going down the hill!
This is the dune buggy. Quite comfortable.
Part of dune buggying is sand boarding (or sand sledding would be more correct). I got a board that looked like a shorter snowboard and a piece of wax. I waxed the board and laid down on top of it. My instructor told me how to lay and where to hold on and gave me a push. I flew down this sand dune and it was amazing. I didn’t eat a lot of sand, which is very good. We went down three different dunes and it was awesome. By far the coolest thing I’ve ever done.
That night I went out with a few girls for pizza and ice cream. Yummy!
We woke up early Saturday morning to go to Paracas. Our itinerary said we were eating breakfast at 8 and leaving at 9, but surprise we were leaving at 8. So I had to get ready to leave really quickly, so quickly that I forgot my pillow and didn’t realize until after we had left.
We arrived in Paracas and our bus wreaked of fish. I almost got sick right then and there. I held it together and walked to the dock where we’d be getting on a boat and taking a tour of an island with a lot of birds, penguins, and seals. I was doing alright after we got in the boat and started the tour. It didn’t smell of fish anymore and the boat was going fast, however, the second we stopped the boat it all went downhill. I got extremely motion sick and then there were literally thousands of birds and penguins and hundreds of seals on this rocky island which means it smelled horribly. Our guide informed us that once every five years the Peruvian government hires people to come to this island and clean it and then the government exports the bird excrement as fertilizers to many places including the United States. Needless to say, I was not in good shape.
When we got back to land I was thrilled, but with land also came the fish smell and restaurants with mostly seafood whose fries taste like fish. I didn’t eat anything.
This is from the island right before I got sick. As you can see, the rocks are red but appear to be white with bird and penguin poop.
We got back on the bus after 2 hours of getting back from the boat tour and I was thrilled. We got on our way to Nazca, our next stop. About an hour into the trip, Michelle, the Lima ISA director, informed me that we were stopping in Ica for my pillow. I was really excited because my achy body (from the dunes) and sick (from the boat and smell of bird poop and fish) really needed that.
We arrived in Nazca and I was starving because I hadn’t eaten all day. I went to a restaurant with two other girls and it wasn’t great, but it got the job done. At night we went to a panetarium show where we saw a presentation on what we were going to see the next day. I didn’t learn a whole lot except about the woman who made the Nazca lines famous.
I went to bed early because I was still sick and very tired.
I had the 6:40 flight to see the Nazca lines. It was interesting. We went up in the very small plane that holds six people (five passengers plus the pilot) and is a very tight squeeze. I got to be the co-pilot and my knees were up to the control board.
We got to see an area view of animal shapes that were mysteriously made many years ago. We went around the first image and we did a very tight figure eight. I honestly thought I was going to toss my cookies. My stomach was so weak from the boat ride the day before.
Me in the co-pilot seat!
This is an image of a while...can you see it?
The mountains where the lines are located are red and it looks like what I imagine Mars would look like.
It was a seven-hour ride back to Lima in the bus. At 4 p.m. I sent a text message to Austry to tell her I didn’t want to be on the bus anymore and all I wanted was to get back to Lima. I still had four hours left in the bus.
It was nice to get back.
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