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Day 3
28th May 2013
Today we will travel three hours to Paracas, a sleeping fishing village that serves as the starting point for all tours to the Ballestas Islands, often referred to as "the poor man's Galapagos". Home to hundreds of sea lions, many species of marine birds, including the Humboldt penguin you are guaranteed to see some incredible wildlife. There is little to do in town but for those that love seafood and are looking to try Peru's national drink, the Pisco Sour, you will be in heaven.
Woke early and sorted out my bags ready to head off to Paracus later. Went for breakfast and my morning coffee and after went outside for a cigarette and met Libby an Australian girl on our trip. I now have a smoking buddy which is always a good thing.
We head south out of Lima and the landscape slowly changes to barren desert. To our right is the Pacific Ocean and on our left are huge sand dunes. Along the edge of the dunes are huge aggregate mining complexes with small shanty towns next to them.
We stop for lunch and due to various delays in our journey we arrive at the hotel around 16:00. Paco informed us during our journey that this area is prone to earthquakes and in 2007 this town was devastated by a very large quake, touch wood he says we won't have any problems as he touches the plastic on the coach, that fills me with confidence lol. We sit out on our balconies for a while enjoying the afternoon sun before heading off for a walk into town and down to the beach to watch the sun setting over the South Pacific. A flock of pelicans are on the beach and some locals encourage them closer to us with some fish so we can get some photos, for a tip of coarse lol. After that we wander down the other end of the road and back onto the beach for some more sunset photos, then walk back to the area we just came from for dinner. We are all given a Pisco sour before we order dinner which is always a good start. The menus are in Spanish and Paco tells us what each item on the menu is. I order mine which was described as chicken in a potato and what a surprise when it arrived, a blob of mash potato in a square with a layer of chicken inside and not a lot of it. I will be about 5 stone lighter at this rate by the end of my trip. Tonight I get to know David and Fiona an Australian couple and I can see that hanging around with these guys and Libby is going to be messy cuz they all like a good drink!!!!!!
After dinner we are invited to watch a short video on the history of the area and then head back to out hotel. It's only 22:00 but have to be up at 06:00 so time to crash.
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Tracey Brant Enjoying reading the blog Ian. I was there in 2007 when the earthquake happened. Had been in the town the day before and luckily where I was there wasn't much damage. Enjoy x