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Saturday morning, we had an early 0700am collection by bus to go into Paracas to visit the Ballestas islands. No time for breakfast and once again the winter woolies were required. We arrived at the port and waited in line to board the small speedboat. After about half hour and trying to avoid the active and very large pelicans that were running around by the jetty... we were advised that the port was actually closed.... So we went off to have some breakfast which consisted of half an advocado within a bread roll.....after about forty mins the port opened and we boarded.
The first thing we passed was the Candelabra. This is a carved outline of a Candelabra in the sand dune hillside. It is something like 100 metres long by 45 metres wide and up to a metre deep. This has been here for thousands of years and has managed to remain untouched as its guarded from the winds by the hillside. Know one really knows what it is there for, there are lots of theories, including that druids smoked a hallucinagenic cactus and then recreated it in the sand...
After about fifteen mins, we arrived at the islands, we circled around and saw many types of bird, sea lions and penguins. The islands are beautiful and the wildlife seems completely untouched as the islands are not inhabited. It was so unspoilt there and it was amazing how close we were able to get to totally wild and endangered creatures..david attenborough would have wet himself..instead we got shat on by seabirds circling above us...still a small price to pay for such an amazing experience.
After an hour we returned to shore and back to our hotel. We had decided to move on to Huacachina this afternoon as Pisco was very quiet and there really was nothing to keep us there. Not only was it quiet but if someone had told us there was a war going on I would not have been surprised such was the derelict state of much of the city.
The poverty in Peru is pretty bad and Pisco was a good/bad example of this. Kids as young as 3 and 4 beg for 1 soles, which is about 15p, and many adults are trying to eek out a living by whatever means they can. Seeing this with your own eyes does make you think a bit about the rights and wrongs of this world...
Anyway we had decided to head to Huacachina which is 4km from a place called Ica. It is an oasis town in the middle of the desert. The bus trip took an hr, no bingo this time unfortunately. We got out and swapped into a taxi which drove us towards huge sand dunes, amongst 300 ft sand dunes appeared this small town centred around a lake complete with pedalo´s.
After the cold of the last week the temperature was a welcome change, really warm and a dry heat too -something Barbados never has..We stepped out and checked in to our hotel. A nice place with swimming pool and all mod cons ' all for 70 soles..about 11 pounds.
Sandboarding and dune buggying are the main activities here and we plan to do both... It seems this is a favourite for WBT´s (world´s best travellers) as there are plenty of people in stupid pants, long hair and no shoes on. A shower, decent meal and a haircut though is all it would take to turn Stuart from Dunstable or Peirre from Paris back into the normal trainee accountants or shop assistants they really are. So far though i have not heard a guitar....
Adios
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