Peru-ving Myself

Taken from my blog: http://www.getjealous.com/getjealous.php?action=showdiaryentry&diary_id=1858390&go=bridgetkramer

I was seated at the very front of the top level of my bus leaving from Lima heading to Paracas, between a Swiss girl and some German sisters. Maybe because we're all blonde, we started chatting, laughing at the near-accidents we could see almost-happen from our prime view point. Lena and Sara, the sisters, were also heading to Paracas, so we disembarked our luxury bus (way more comfortable than a plane) into the tiny bay town of Paracas. Absolutely gorgeous. Very small, governed by dirt roads, but had way too many "taxis" for the amount of people there. We all stayed in a small hotel - Refugio del Pirata (Yes, that does translate to 'Refuge of the Pirate'), explored the town together, found the Hilton and walked through it (probably a mistake. That pool was stunning) and then found a small place to have some ceviche and to try our first pisco sours. At least, we thought we were trying pisco sours. Pretty sure we had said 'jarra de pisco sour', and Lena had even pointed to it on the menu... A jug of icy yellowy stuff came out, and with all of us being pisco sour virgins, we happily poured it into our glasses, tried it, and were very pleased and surprised at how easy it was to drink. And also wondering why we weren't feeling anything from it. After getting the bill and seeing "lemonade" written instead, all we could do was laugh. At least we didn't get charged for pisco. So we went back to the hotel, to the bar, and got our second first pisco sours, and this time they were genuine, and they were STRONG! Enjoying pisco sours while watching Peruvian soap operas on the terrace of a bay side hotel is definitely a highlight for me. 

The next morning I got up and ready to do the tour of the Ballestas Islands, which is frequently described as the "poor man's Galapagos". Bumping into an American from the hostel in Lima, I automatically had a "I'll take a picture of you with your camera if you take one of me with my camera" buddy. It was great to be on a boat, and I was surprised to be supplied with life jackets, even if they were flimsy and over-sized. The islands stank. A lot. All the birds on the islands poop on them (naturally) and it's actually harvested and sold to Europe or something. White gold. But other than the stench, they were gorgeous rocky cliffy type islands, with millions of penguins, pelicans, cormorants and sea lions perched (in the case of the birds) or draped lazily (in the case of the sea lions) them. After returning from the boat tour I booked myself onto a tour of the national park, seeing as I had a whole afternoon to kill before my next bus left. I had spent all of my efectivo (cash), and so asked the receptionist to point me in the direction of the ATM (presuming there was one). The town did have one, I went there, and as I got there a maintenance man was explaining in broken English to another tourist that it was broken, and he'd have to use the one at the Hilton, that one being the only other ATM in town. I had about 10 minutes until the tour left, but knew I couldn't get away without having money because the tour included a stop at a restaurant, and as I was pretty peckish already, I definitely wasn't going empty-walleted. So I tell the receptionist the ATM's not working and that I'll quickly run to the Hilton. It's too far, he tells me. 4 kilometres, you won't make it back it time. Here, I have a friend with a taxi who will take you there and back for 10 soles. (All in Spanish. Nice to know they sound dodgy even in their native tongue). But I was a little delirious from hunger, so decided to get this friend's taxi. I swear it wasn't that far to the Hilton when I walked along the coast with Lena and Sara. But I got there, the doormen at the Hilton knew exactly what I was there for (what? I don't look like a Hilton guest?), got back in time and when I went to pay the taxista with a 50 he asked me, Don't you have change? Umm... pretty sure you just took me on a trip specifically to get cash because I didn't have any? No, amigo, I don't have anything smaller. So now we go walking to the little shops that are definitely designed just for locals, who also don't seem to have change. I was kind of hoping he'd give me the nice-face discount and let me off, but eventually he found a lady with change. Just in time for my next tour. 

I get on the mini bus and am sharing my tour of the Reserva Nacional de Paracas with two French women, a couple consisting of a Dutch woman and a Peruvian guy, their two bilingual toddlers and 2 of their Peruvian nannies. So I got to practice Spanish some more and feel shamed by the fact that the 2 and 4 year old kids could say more complicated things in 2 languages than me. The national park is essentially desert and dramatic cliffs running down to the Pacific Ocean. We got out and walked around a lot, around some beaches and viewpoints and the guide guided us all in Spanish (again, helping me reinforce the language). At one point he even gave us bags to collect shells in. Instead of doing this I took photos of the many dead animals I managed to find. I noticed the Peruvian man and the 4 year old son getting closer to the dead sea lion, so decided to give them the heads up, he didn't seem terribly horrified and I later looked to see the whole family surrounded the decomposing mammal. Family bonding time. We were taken to a gorgeous little restaurant right on a gorgeous little beach, where I had my second real pisco sour and a little explore on a cliff. We then went to Playa Roja (Red Beach), it being an extremely rare beach with red sand. Kind of cool. Back on the bus and to town. 

I said my farewells to the staff at the Pirate hotel, slipped my e-mail address under the German girls' door and lugged my stuff up to the bus station (that is essentially a bamboo hut... thanks to a huge earthquake a few years ago) and waited for my (late) bus to Ica. Arriving in Ica, I find a taxi quick enough to take me to the hostel I'd booked. I get to the hostel (La Florida Inn), and despite booking a dorm room I was put in a private room, and am pretty sure I was the only person staying there. The room was huge, concrete, and had a hideous mural of some kind of sharp-toothed bird. Very unnerving. I'd arrived at night time and the hotel was in a residential street, so I didn't want to go venturing out. So I stayed in my room and ate alfajores and watched Glee dubbed in Spanish on TV (at least it had TV). The following morning I got up, took myself to the museum (again, the only person there) and saw some pretty cool Incan mummies and misshaped heads and what not, but realising that that was probably all Ica had to offer me, I checked out of Florida and got a taxi to nearby oasis town of Huacachina. 

Huacachina is absolutely gorgeous. It is literally an oasis - a lake set in the middle of some high dunes which has been developed around. I checked out one hostel, but they were lacking hot water and the room was just a bed and nothing else, so I made my way over to the Lonely Planet recognised, HI-affiliated 'Desert Nights'. This is where my fellow gringos are at. I set myself up on the terrace restaurant and fed myself an amazing omelette from the restaurant, and then took myself for a wander around the whole town (it took about 20 minutes), practised some more Spanish with some merchants and returned to the hostel where my included* dune buggie/sand boarding tour was about to begin. There were 7 of us on the trip - 2 Canadian girls, 2 English guys (although not travelling together), 2 American girls, and me. It was only the Canadians and me who weren't up for the proper standing sand-boarding experience, we were all about the on-your-belly-flying-down-steep-sand-face-first action. The dune buggie driver was nuts. Imagine a roller coaster, where if it crashes, there's a good chance that no one will ever find your remains. He took sharp corners and flew down steep descents, and it only got crazier after I told him "Tu eres loco!!". The sand boarding was amazing fun, so much better than I expected. I'm no adrenaline junkie, and heights are not my friend, but for some reason I felt safe flying down sand dunes face first. Even if it did put sand in all sorts of uncomfortable places. So we did several runs, with each hill getting steeper and steeper, we took in the desert sunset with everyone trying to out-do each other with cheesy poses. Pure magic. 

Back at the hostel I was invited to join a table of an Aussie couple I'd met at the Paracas bus station, so we had a fair good yarn, some dinner and some (many) alcoholic beverages. The bartender, Mega was the name he gave us, even shouting us a few free ones, and gave us some vouchers to use at the pub (which was called 'The Pub') across the oasis that night. Found ourselves to be the only people there along with a group of people from England, a Welshman and a Dutchman (the latter two being in no sound state of mind). More beverages and trying to play DJ, I took myself back to Desert Nights, followed by the hostel dogs (who had decided to follow us to the Pub. Good dogs.) Took myself to bed without even getting changed, and had a moment of fear and amusement when the Dutchman came in and couldn't seem to work out which bed was his. He got there eventually. 

The following morning was cruisy. I didn't have to leave until 5PM, so had a leisurely breakfast with Matt, one of the English guys from the buggie tour, and Austin, an American guy also staying at the hostel. We decided that it was a perfect day for a winery tour. So we booked it with the hostel, got taken in some guy's car that had seatbelts, but no buckles for the belts (standard practice here it seems). We were taken to the first one and immediately given free samples - a white, 2 reds, a rose and a shot of pure pisco. I couldn't finish the pisco (it's basically just the alcohol derived from wine). It makes your tongue numb and gives you that instantaneous feeling of necessity to vomit. So I made one of the boys "man up" for me and finish it. Sometimes it's good to have a vagina. So we got taken around the winery and taught a little bit about the process of wine and pisco making. Back in the dude's car to the other winery, where we had a guide who was so eager to practice all the English slang tourists have taught him. For Australia he had been taught "FIGJAM". It sounded familiar to me but I didn't quite get it. It stands for "Fuck I'm good, just ask me". Something I think we used to say back in 98? An obscure thing for someone to teach him. Anyway, he kept saying that we do the tour and then "get pissed". He knows what tourists want. So we tried more wines and piscos (I manned up this time and finished), bought a bottle of pisco sour and took it back to the oasis to drink it, purely for the cause of wasting time. 

I got on my next bus, this one taking me to Nazca. I was greeted by a woman holding my name on a piece of paper, and despite this a whole bunch of taxistas eager for my business. I safely arrived at the Walk On Inn (and thankful for it, I've heard nasty things about night-time-Nazca), greeted by the host who I think was Dutch, and shown my dorm room where I was the only occupant. This was good because it meant I got to test out all of the beds and choose the best one for myself. And there was really only one good one. I went to bed fairly early so I could get up in the morning for my flight over the World Heritage Nazca lines (I feel I have to add the "World Heritage" in to make it sound important, and to make those of you who don't know about them feel bad about not knowing about them....) I got up and was informed the bus would pick me up at 10.30 (fairly common for there to be delays due to slight winds etc..), so I hung around in the common area until it was time to go. Soon enough the two Canadian girls from Huacachina joined me. They were staying at a different hostel but had booked the tour with mine because no one at their hostel spoke any English. At about 10.15 I went to the reception to pay for the flight, but not having sufficient cash, I ask if I can pay by card. No can do. I was pointed in the direction of the ATM, but as I hadn't explored Nazca yet and the streets were sporadically labelled, I knew it could only work out in my favour. The ATM was broken, so I ran back to the hostel, thinking they wouldn't let me fly. Thankfully they're lovely people and said I could go to another ATM later and pay later. Ah perfecto. 

We got picked up in the mini-bus - me, Christine & Sonia the Canadians, and an English couple staying at my hostel. We were dropped at the airport, weighed (they have to do weight distributions for the planes) and waited around a little while until we could go. It was a tiny 6 seater plane (discluding the pilots' seats) and bumpy as all hell. Even the take off was bumpy, and it kept doing that lungy thing where you feel your stomach hit the back of your throat. There's a reason they equip those planes with plastic bags. But the lines were fantastic. Some of them were difficult to see because of other lines left over them from other things like cars, but flying really is the only way to see them. The pilot dips the plane to the right so the people on the right get a clear view and a chance for photos, and then does it for the people on the left. Very difficult to get good photos though, as on your screen it looks just like dirt, which I guess, essentially, it is. But we went past all the classics - the monkey, spider, condor, astronaut (why would ancient peoples draw an astronaut in the sand? How did they know what an astronaut was? ALIENS!!), tree, hands... the whole gang. After landing I realised I wasn't the only one who felt the roughness of the flight. I think I actually took it the best, and I wasn't feeling crash hot. After waiting a while for our mini bus driver to take us back to the hostel, and realising no one actually knew if we were getting picked up or not... eventually he came. I took myself exploring around the township of Nazca (there's really not much), found a hole in the wall lunch place called El Punto Azul, which was essentially just someone's house where I was served a wonderful chicken flavoured soup with a mysterious meat in it, the best milanesa (schnitzel) of my life with a Russian salad and a cordial all for 6 soles (roughly $2). Magical. I then wasted the rest of my day at the hostel waiting for my 10PM bus. This time there were actually some other people at the hostel - an Aussie guy, a Dutch girl, and the other English guy from the buggie tour (Gary) who was feeling violently ill from some kind of parasite. So I walked with him into town to try and find something for him, he was told to go to a doctor, and I got Chinese food. Really cheap and good fried rice that can feed you for days! It's my new trade secret. No pharmacist or doctor seemed to be able to help Gary, so he stocked up on gatorade and hope. 

My 10PM bus actually left at midnight, and there was a guy who'd stolen my seat. The road to Arequipa was windy but other than that, fine. Have made friends with a Turkish guy from the bus, so don't have to wander around searching for Alpaca related things alone. Speaking of which, we're now off with some other hostel kids to eat some. Until next time, faithful blog readers! 


* I'm doing a thing called the 'Bamba Experience'. Basically, you pay a lump sum, and they sort out all your buses for you and activities in most of the places you go to along the way, you just have to e-mail them to tell you when you want the next bus. And they go with a really good bus company too, and the tours with them have all been wonderful (Ballestas and Dune Buggie are the ones I've done so far)

• Peru
• paracas
• ballestas
• ica
• huacachina
• Oasis
• nazca
• nazca lines
• arequipa
• Bus