Huacachina (July 3-4, 2006)

We had hoped to sleep in this morning, but the parrots and the roosters woke us up early. The only complaint we had about this place was that it was a bit noisy, especially with all the construction that they had going on. It looked like they were redoing the whole front of the building. We ate breakfast at the hostel, and Jessica fed some of her fruit and her chocolate sauce to the macaw – he really liked the chocolate sauce in particular. After breakfast we wandered around the town to check out the different dune buggy ride options. We wanted a small one that only seated four people rather than one of the bigger ones that seated nine. Our hostel wouldn’t guarantee a small buggy, so we ended up booking at the same place we had eaten dinner last night – another hostel/restaurant around the corner. We made arrangements to go for our ride at 3:00, which would give us some time to relax and hang out around the pool for a couple of hours, which is precisely what we did. It was nice to finally get some colour on our legs instead of just our arms and faces.

The dune buggy ride was awesome! It lasted a little over two hours, and was like a roller coaster ride. We stopped a few times to try sand boarding – at first we just went zooming down lying on the board on our stomach (much like tobogganing), and then we tried doing it standing up. Being a snowboarder, I thought it was going to be easier than it was. Turns out carving is not easy in sand, so we all fell down a lot. In the end, Jessica and I decided it was more fun to go fast down the hill on our stomachs than slowly on our butts. Part way through our ride, we had some engine trouble and sat for around twenty minutes while our driver tried to fix the problem. We aren’t sure what was wrong, but he was pulling out spark plugs at one point. Eventually he got it working again, which made us happy because we weren’t looking forward to walking back through the sand dunes! By the end of the ride we were all completely full of sand, including all our pockets, shoes, bras, underwear, etc. Our bathroom floor was never quite clean again after that.

After showering and cleaning up, we went out for dinner. We thought we would try the only Italian place in town but we had to wait half an hour for it to open. It turned out that there weren’t very many options on their menu, and only one choice for a vegetarian meal (pasta with pesto). They weren’t willing to make any changes to any other dishes, and we found out it was because all the dishes were pre-made and just heated up when people ordered them. The food was pretty good, but we decided we wouldn’t be eating there again.

After dinner I called Charlene, and it was great to hear her voice again. Her and Mike were taking possession of their new house on July 5^th, and also getting very excited about their trip to Kenya on the 12^th. Such busy lives! I guess we aren’t really ones to comment on busy lives and travelling…

:: July 4 ::

Today Jessica had booked a trip to go to the Islas Ballestas, which are off the coast of the Paracas National Park, around an hour north of Ica. The islands have tons of birds, sea lions, penguins, etc. and is dubbed the “poor man’s Galapagos”. Since we are going to the real Galapagos at the end of July, and are trying to spend less money, we stayed behind at the hostel and relaxed for the day. Jessica had to leave at 5:30am, and we never quite got back to sleep after she left due to the birds and the construction that started at 8:30am. Both Lincoln and I weren’t feeling very well – Lincoln with an iffy stomach and me with another bad cold (it started on the Salkantay trek and has been very slowly getting worse) – so a day of relaxation was good for us. We played with the parrots for a while and fed them some fruit. One of them came down to our table when he saw our food appear and started trying to eat my bread and jam! He was very cute and kept saying “hola” and making funny noises, one of which has become a favourite of ours (“raw-raw-raw-raw”).

Jessica arrived back at the hostel around 2:00pm and raved about her trip. She had some great pictures on her camera, and had even seen some dolphins swimming alongside her boat. We hung out by the pool for a while longer, and then walked up to the top of the biggest sand dune to watch the sunset. The walk up in the sand was surprisingly tough, but a good workout. The views from the top were great, and we had another dog follow us up there. What’s with the dogs that like climbing to high places? The sunset wasn’t superb, but it was good enough and we got some good photos. The best part was running back down the sand dunes – it was great fun taking giant leaps and sinking into the sand.

Tonight we went to a pizza place for dinner. The pizza was okay, but they used a funny cheese on it and the crust was kind of sweet so I didn’t like it much. Lincoln didn’t make it all the way through dinner and had to go back to the hostel to use the bathroom, poor guy. Jess and I treated ourselves to some chocolate pie for dessert. Yum!