Huacachina

Now here is an interesting little place. When I first checked into it, it shows a nice oasis in the middle of the sand dunes just outside of the city Ica. It also said to take a sand buggy ride out there and go thru the sand dunes.  I enter the address on maps.me to the tour office I read was good. And before we know we are right in the busy little village of Huacachina!! Lots of traffic, people, vendors etc. Not at all what I was expecting to see.  So we find a parking spot close to the tour office and walked over.  It was around noon and the guy in the office said the best time to go is around 5pm because it's a little cooler. So we booked for 5pm S/30 ea ($12C)

We cross over to the walkway around the little oasis.  VERY busy today being a holiday.  We look at some menus for hamburgers, and they're all S/20 ($8) for just a plain burger. Fries are extra S/4 ($2) Sound like gringo prices to me!! There are lots of hostels here along with hotels. Thinking the locals only visit for the day and buy their food from the vendors. We keep walking and then find a daily special S/20 for hamburger, fries and Corona!! Now can't go bad with that! So we went in and ordered. The beer was nice and cold, the hamburger we weren't sure if it was a veggie burger or real meat - very dry and tasteless. I even had to put on ketchup to try and get it to taste better!! So only ate half of that and the fries are the big kind so only ate a few of the ones that were smaller and crispy.  But the beer was good LOL!!!!

Tall sand dunes behind the oasis

Nice walkway around the oasis with hotels and restaurants

Kids having fun even though there are signs saying no swimming. The oasis is a little green but mostly from reflections

Wayyyy up top you can see 3 people walking along the ridge

Sand boarder

Dwayne walked up to where all the sand buggies park

There are a few up there!

We walk around the lake some more after lunch and then head to Vanna. But once we got inside it was to hot!! Even with the exhaust fan and the portable fan going it was uncomfortable . So we packed a blanket and couple of pillows, readers, water and headed over to find a grassy spot by the lake to keep cool for a couple of hours.  We found one but only lasted for about an hour because it wasn't very comfy - I kept getting ants climbing my legs! So off we go again back to Vanna. By the time we get there it has cooled off a little so a little more bearable inside. Only another hour to wait before we go to the tour office to go to the sand buggy.

The sand buggies were a blast!!! They reminded Dwayne of his modified racing car back in 1998 :) The driver and 8 of us tore thru the desert dunes, up and down steep inclines! So much fun. Then we had to stop so the others could lay on a snowboard hang onto the binding and go down the hill. Not very fast, Dwayne tried it - I thought I'm not going down and then have to walk up in loose sand!! I remember doing that in the Sahari and it's not easy!! This is more fun for the locals. Then we get to go for a ride again! Even though we were not out driving for an hour - as we were told - for the $24C we paid we had alot of fun! Hope the videos will post on the blog.

Yup just a few waiting to go out

Not sure but do you think she might be from Canadà????

Unfortunately this video didnt post, tried a couple of times but can't get rid of the boxes! :( 

We end up moving Vanna a little further down the road to spend the night. Where we were parked was right across from a bar - one of many on the street - so for sure it was not going to be quiet!

In the morning we head out to find the Nazca Lines - those unexplained lines and pictures in the sand! But first I get online and book tickets for Machu Picchu - no problem - 2 tickets for Jan 8th S/304 ($112C) Then booked the train from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes - 2 return tickets $317C.  Room is $79C for 2 nights - so total of about $511C before food 😓 Plus we have to pay to park Vanna somewhere in Ollantaytambo for 3 days. That is really going to increase our costs for the month in Peru! Oh well "once in a lifetime place to see" 😃  Anyways........

Then we head out and first find a place to get Vanna's oil changed. Dwayne already bought the oil (synthetic) and had the oil filter, just need a guy to change it. And we did - only S/15 ($6C) Now good for another 9000kms.

Then we drive towards the town of Nasca which is 2 hours away. As we get closer to the town we come across a fairly high viewing tower right next to the highway.  Cost S/4 ($2) to climb up and see the geoglyphs.  We can only see 3 different ones from up here - the lizard which has the Panamerica highway cutting thur his tail! And the tree and hand. Just so strange that they believe these were made between 500BC and 500AD making them 2000 years old!! The geoglyphs cover 50 sq kms. Lots of lines and more then 70 are designs of animals, trees, flowers and humans The lines are not even that deep - 4-6" only and I wonder how has the sand not blown back into those lines over the years. "They" explain it by saying this area doesn't get a lot of wind, plus I would think very little rain. They were first spotted around in 1927 by a Peruvian archaeologist who saw them while hiking in the foothills. Anyways, odd as it is it's still cool to finally see them.

As we leave the soft sand dunes the hills get higher and rocky

This is a new viewing stand but for some reason not open even though it looks finished

This is the one we had to use

This picture shows all the different geoglyphs in the area. The green arrow points to where the viewing stand is. We could see 7 - lizard with highway going thru his tail, 11 - the tree and 6- hands. The rest would have to be seen by plane

The tree

The hands

This is the best I could get of the lizard, if you click on the picture to enlarge it you can see it a little better 

We get to the town of Nasca where Dwayne talked to a welder about getting the hitch fixed. So tomorrow we go back and get that done. After that we will start going to Ollantaytambo and hopefully slowly enough that my head won't feel like that water bottle!😂😂