Vive la vida
Trip Start
Apr 30, 2007
1
15
46
Trip End
Ongoing
Huacachina,
Peru
Monday, December 1, 2008
I checked into the first hotel I could find, which was cheap but kind of run down. Huacachina is a really strange place, with foreigners being the only tourists that stay the night and during the day bus loads of young Peruvians come for the dunes. The "town" is like an old school resort with colonial style buildings set around a rather dissapointing lagoon with some trees around. Huge sand dunes impose upon the town and feel as though they will swallow the whole place at any moment.
It was strange to be in a place full of gringos after only hanging out with locals in Lima, but after changing to a "party" hostel the second night I made some friends and joined a dune buggy tour for two hours.. racing over and around the dunes, eating sand and having a great time. We also did sandboarding which is like snowboarding only slower and more difficult to turn.
The next day I went on a winery tour despite not really liking wine.. it was something to do anyway and found some nice Sangria... nothing much really interesting happened in Huacahina so its just a post of what happened!
I did by conincidence meet Roberto the Swiss guy that I met briefly the night I met Susan and Yaeko two weeks ago in Lima.. I didnt realise it was him for an hour and he didnt realise who I was until I told him!
Huacachina got old pretty fast so Roberto and I made the trip to Nazca and negotiated for a flight over the lines. They are kind of impressive but if you have seen photos you know what they look like. The flight in a three passenger plane was half the fun though!
If you remember I got given a fake 100 soles note (US$33) in Lima, well I managed to pass it off finally in Nazca after a few unsuccessful attempts, the stupid Nazca flights sales guy trusted me and didnt even check if it was real! I had had many opportunities to pass it off before but had real problems paying my hostel or teacher with a fake note for all their hard work! It was strange, I had been ripped off by being given the note, but didnīt want to do the same to someone else. The expensive Nazca lines tour operators were the receipients and now its their problem, it will probably end up with another tourist!
To kill time while waiting for the night bus to Arequipa we walked around town..and for some reason received lots of smiles and waves from the local chicas.. not sure why, maybe we smelt bad!
