I had about 4 days to get back to Lima from Copacabana in Bolivia. So I caught three buses back to back (about 22 hours all up) and passed through the popular tourist spots of
Puno, Arequipa (I'd been to both of those places a few weeks prior), Nazca (I wasn't too interested in seeing the Nazca lines) and chose to stop at
Ica for my last couple of days.
Ica is surrounded by desert - the classic sand dune type desert that you learned about in primary school. Massive, rolling dunes that go on forever in all directions with no sign of life or water whatsoever. Except for Huacachina - the oasis in the middle of the desert. Synonymous with sand deserts is the dream of a tropical oasis that is so often just a mirage in the eyes of a poor lost man in the Sahara. But Huacachina is a real oasis - I stayed a couple of nights there just to prove it wasn't!
Huacachina is an oasis formed by a natural spring, and is a popular resort town for Peruvians in the summer, and for backpackers at any time of the year. Unfortunately you can't swim in the lake like you once could due to pollution, but most of the cheap hostels and hotels have a swimming pool to relax by.
There wasn't much to do there after you had walked around the lake, except relax or take a dune buggy / sandboarding tour. Both were extremely rewarding. The dune buggy tour was doubly great because I bumped into Pete from England again (who I had been on the ill-fated Salar de Uyuni tour with a couple of weeks earlier) - its a small world when your travelling on the gringo trail in South America!
The dune buggy tour was amazing - within minutes of hopping in (and with no safety precautions or warnings) we were absolutely flying up, down, over and around the biggest sand dunes I've ever seen in my life - it was pure exhiliaration, with a hint of danger, as the buggy wasn't the safest looking vehicle I'd been in recently. But it certainly tackled the dunes with aplomb and was faster and more thrilling than any rollercoaster I've been on in my life.
Then we would attempt to sandboard down some dunes (with plenty of stacks on everyone's behalf), and luxuriously be driven back to the top to do it all over again. Even though it took days to get the sand out of all the crevices in my body, it was great fun.
The wax on the base of the sandboards was essential and made for a fast first ride, then progressively slower each consecutive ride until you almost got bogged, even on a steep dune. Then you'd get the driver to "wax 'er up again" and hold on for the fun first ride.
After the oasis I stayed a night in Ica with a local Peruvian in his very humble, basic home. He lived with his mother in a 2 room house with many other families within the same building. There was no running water in his home, nor a toilet, and I slept on the concrete floor. All the families shared a non-flushing toilet and a sink down around the back. His mother ran a small cafeteria inside the immigration department of Ica and she cooked us a beautiful lunch two days in a row. Milton was very generous and took pride in showing me around his town, to his friends birthday party, his English school, and the nearby
bodegas (wineries) where the national drink pisco is produced. Since I was at end of my trip and I still had a few gifts from Australia in my backpack, I gave Milton everything as well as some clothes and books that I no longer needed that I think he appreciated. I even gave him a Wiseacre cd and shirt as he played the trumpet - I bet it's a bit different to the type of music he is used to here though!
So another overnight bus and then straight to the airport in Lima for a few hours sleep and the redeye flight back to Buenos Aires, which marked the end of an amazing trip in Peru and Bolivia. I couldn't wait for a nice comfortable bed and a hot shower though!
I had about 4 days to get back to Lima from Copacabana in Bolivia. So I caught three buses back to back (about 22 hours all up) and passed through the popular tourist spots of Puno, Arequipa (I'd been to both of those places a few weeks prior), Nazca (I wasn't too interested in seeing the Nazca lines) and chose to stop at Ica for my last couple of days. Ica is surrounded by desert - the classic sand dune type desert that you learned about in primary school. Massive, rolling dunes that go on forever in all directions with no sign of life or water whatsoever. Except for Huacachina - the oasis in the middle of the desert. Synonymous with sand deserts is the dream of a tropical oasis that is so often just a mirage in the eyes of a poor lost man in the Sahara. But Huacachina is a real oasis - I stayed a couple of nights there just to prove it wasn't!
Huacachina is an oasis formed by a natural spring, and is a popular resort town for Peruvians in the summer, and for backpackers at any time of the year. Unfortunately you can't swim in the lake like you once could due to pollution, but most of the cheap hostels and hotels have a swimming pool to relax by.
There wasn't much to do there after you had walked around the lake, except relax or take a dune buggy / sandboarding tour. Both were extremely rewarding. The dune buggy tour was doubly great because I bumped into Pete from England again (who I had been on the ill-fated Salar de Uyuni tour with a couple of weeks earlier) - its a small world when your travelling on the gringo trail in South America!
The dune buggy tour was amazing - within minutes of hopping in (and with no safety precautions or warnings) we were absolutely flying up, down, over and around the biggest sand dunes I've ever seen in my life - it was pure exhiliaration, with a hint of danger, as the buggy wasn't the safest looking vehicle I'd been in recently. But it certainly tackled the dunes with aplomb and was faster and more thrilling than any rollercoaster I've been on in my life.
Then we would attempt to sandboard down some dunes (with plenty of stacks on everyone's behalf), and luxuriously be driven back to the top to do it all over again. Even though it took days to get the sand out of all the crevices in my body, it was great fun.
The wax on the base of the sandboards was essential and made for a fast first ride, then progressively slower each consecutive ride until you almost got bogged, even on a steep dune. Then you'd get the driver to "wax 'er up again" and hold on for the fun first ride.
After the oasis I stayed a night in Ica with a local Peruvian in his very humble, basic home. He lived with his mother in a 2 room house with many other families within the same building. There was no running water in his home, nor a toilet, and I slept on the concrete floor. All the families shared a non-flushing toilet and a sink down around the back. His mother ran a small cafeteria inside the immigration department of Ica and she cooked us a beautiful lunch two days in a row. Milton was very generous and took pride in showing me around his town, to his friends birthday party, his English school, and the nearby bodegas (wineries) where the national drink pisco is produced. Since I was at end of my trip and I still had a few gifts from Australia in my backpack, I gave Milton everything as well as some clothes and books that I no longer needed that I think he appreciated. I even gave him a Wiseacre cd and shirt as he played the trumpet - I bet it's a bit different to the type of music he is used to here though!
So another overnight bus and then straight to the airport in Lima for a few hours sleep and the redeye flight back to Buenos Aires, which marked the end of an amazing trip in Peru and Bolivia. I couldn't wait for a nice comfortable bed and a hot shower though!
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