Huacachina

Huacachina is built around a small natural lake in the desert. Called the "Oasis of America".

The town consists of a lagoon, and hotels and restaurants around it. The lagoon was beautiful. You can paddle boat or rowboat.

But the most popular thing to do is to take a sand dune buggy tour and to sandboard. The sandboarding I thought would be somewhat easy since I sort of know how to snowboard. But it wasn´t quite the same. I tried it a few times and then decided to just go down on my stomach like everyone else. It was way more fun. But the really fun part was the dune buggy ride. It went super fast, up and down steep hills of sand. It was like a roller coaster ride, scary at times.

And we stopped to catch the sunset. It was a great day.

Ica, Peru

On Saturday morning I travelled from Lima to Ica, which took about 4 hours. I actually stayed in a town close to Ica called Huacachina. That afternoon I went on a wine, pisco, and chocolate factory tour in and around Ica. Ica is known for their Pisco, a brandy type of drink that is about 40% alcohol. It is distilled from grapes. Ica is also where grapes, cotton, asparagus, olives and other produce is cultivated. It is known by Peruvians as the land of the sun.

There were about 7 of us on this tour with two funny taxi drivers. The other tourists were Brits and Norwegians. I was the only American. We went to a chocolate factory..... well it was more like a store where we sampled chocolate from a place called Helena. It was good, but not really tour worthy.

Then we went to Tacama, the oldest winery in South America. We saw some workers leaving for the day, and viewed their entire property from a bell tower. We sampled some red and some white wine and one pisco drink. Whoa. Pisco is really strong stuff. I was already feeling tipsy.

Then we went to a place that made all different types of Pisco, Catador. He explained the process of making pisco- the pressing, fermentation, distillation, condensation, and separation. Then the tasting. We must have had almost 10 different kinds of pisco. And they weren´t stingy with the portions.

The last place was Bodega Lazo. It wasn´t really very touristy. It was one of the local bodegas. A really nice Peruvian couple joined us in the middle of our tour. They even had relatives in New Jersey. Here, we had more wine and of course more pisco. ¨Arriba, Abajo, Al Centro, Adentro!¨

With all the drinks, (there were a lot of drinks had), the tour only cost me about $7. The wines we tried were mostly sweet. Not really my thing. The piscos didn´t really taste that great, and it smelled like tequila, but when in Peru, drink Pisco. It was a blast!

Back in Lima

After Huaraz, I went back to Lima for a day, last Friday. I couldn´t really do much since I had some kind of allergic reaction to some insect bites on my feet. My ankles had swollen up and it was painful to walk. I looked up these words in my handy travel sized spanish-english dictionary: ankle-tobillo, isect bite-mordisco de insecto, swelling-hinchazon. I went over to the pharmacy and explained my problem with my new vocabulary and showed them my feet. So the pharmacist gave me some medicine and some cream. You don´t need a prescription! That´s how it should be.

Anyway, I did manage earlier in the day to do one more touristy thing in Lima. I went to Huaca Pucllana. It was a place that had ruins of an adobe pyramid of the Lima culture from 400AD. The tour was pretty interesting. Small adobe bricks were made of mud and seashells by hand and were placed in vertical rows that look like book shelves to make the walls and platforms. The walls had trapezoidal panels. Its amazing that the stuctures are still standing from 400AD.

Figurines showing the process of making adobe bricks:

There were a series of plazas and enclosures probably used for public meetings. There were also areas were religious ceremonies took place. A religious ceremony with an offering of a pot:

While I was there, there happened to be an archeologist discovering another human skull, most likely used for human sacrifice. They always used women for human sacrifice, but that is because the worshipped the sun and moon gods, thought to be female.

They also had some flora and fauna there that were typical of the Lima people. They had some hairless dogs there that are only found in Lima. There were also other typical Peruvian animals: ginea pig, ducks, llamas, alpacas, etc.

Huaraz

I finally got to go rock climbing!!! After being sourrounded by mountains down here in South America, I was dying to go climbing. I went to a town called Huaraz, about 8 hours north of Lima. It is located among the Cordilleras Blanca which I heard was the ¨Swiss Alps¨of South America. It is the highest mountain range in the world outside of the Himalyas. I only went for a few days to take care of my climbing fix, but to really appreciate this area you would need more time. There are tons of climbing, mountaineering, trekking, ice climbing, and big wall action type of activities you can do here.

The guy that ran the hostel I stayed in in Lima, gave me the name of a good climbing company and a good hostel to stay in in Huaraz. I hired a guide with Monttrek for about $22 a day including gear rental and transportation. His name was Ronald. He also brought his friend, Ronald also, and his dog. I think the dog´s name was Vanna or Danna. Not sure.

The first day, we went to an area called Chancos, near Marcara. It seemed to be the place that all the guides took first time climbers. There were 8 climbs there, single pitches. Most of it was pretty easy. Even the dog climbed.

The next day we went to a wall called Los Olivos. This area had much more harder rated climbs. The hike was pretty nice and the view from the crag was beautiful. My guide forgot his harness though. He just made one with rope. Yikes.

This is me at the crux (el crux in spanish) of one of the climbs. I don´t know exactly what scale they use in Peru. He said it was an 8 in whatever scale they use. It felt like a hard 5.10c in Yosemite ratings. But I´m no sure. I haven´t climbed in a while and was pretty wiped out quickly. I blame the altitude.

Here is the main plaza in Huaraz, and the view of the town from the hostal. Notice the snow capped mountains in the background.

Lima, Peru

Last Friday I took a bus from Guayaquil, Ecuador to Lima, Peru. The bus took about 26 hours. But the bus was really nice - reclining chairs, food service, and lots and lots of movies. It wasn´t too bad. They also help you with the border crossings. Some bus companies don´t wait for you at the border. But this bus company, Ormeno, was ¨royal class¨. At the border there are people (not in uniform) that try to charge you for your stamp. Also, there are people that change your money from US Dollars (thats what they use in Ecuador) to Peruvian Nuevo soles, but at a terrible rate. I wan´t going to change any money, but another gringo on the bus said it was legit. I knew I would need some Peruvian money for a taxi when I got to Lima, so I changed $20. I totally got ripped off. Maybe I should´ve not listened to him. Oh well. This was not the first or last time I´m sure that I´ll get ¨gringo-ed¨. You win some you lose some. I won´t sweat it too much.

On Sunday I did some exploring in Lima. I went to the Centro Historico to Plaza de Armas. I got there and there happened to be a huge mass for Corpus Cristi in front of the Catedral de Lima. The cardinal was giving the mass. The plaza was full of people for the mass. It was really beautiful. I was really lucky.

Afterwards I went to check out Iglesia de San Francisco. They had a tour of the church, monastary, and catacombs but no pictures allowed. It was a really great tour. There were beautiful murals, paintings, furniture, an amazing library all from the 17th and 18th century. There were many rooms with the Spanish moorish type of arcitecture. The catacombs were pretty creepy. Bones, skulls, and skeletons from the 18th century.

I ended up seeing a parade too for the Corpus Christi.

After trying to cross the parade, I went to the Museo de la Incuisicion y del Congreso. The tour group was pretty big so I missed a lot of the explanations. There were wax figures of the torture methods used back in the day.

After that I checked out Iglesia Santo Domingo and Plaza San Martin.

Then I headed for the waterfront area. I went to Larco Mar. Its this toursity mall with restaurants and everything. (Yvette, there´s a Hooters there. I thought of you.) I walked all along the waterfront. There were a few parks. There was one called Parque del Amour, which was absolutely the worst place to go when you are missing your boyfriend. There´s a big statue of people making out, and there were couples everywhere making out. It was terrible. The worst place in Lima. But the waterfront area is really nice. You can see surfers out in the water.