My Legs Are Burning

When we planned our trip we had few ideas about what to expect. We knew there would be beaches in Thailand, snow in Russia, that it would be hot in Dubai, but Peru .......well we had no idea what it would look like but sand dunes? Who knew? So for this (very surprising) reason we spent the five hour bus ride along the coast to Ica, staring out the window, mesmorised by the enormous sand dunes stretching as far as the eye could see.

01 - On the Road

We were heading to Ica to stay in a little resort town a few kilometers away called Huacachina (we've nicknamed it Hoochi-mamma as we can't pronounce it), to go sand boarding. You'd think we would have realised there would be sand involved. When we arrived we were met at the bus station by the normal array of taxi drivers all preaching the benefits of their particular hostel, after choosing one we headed off and surprisingly enough didn't get ripped off by the driver. We are loving Peru for this reason. People are friendly and honest. Obviously the hostel we ended up at paid the most commission as every person on our bus was ferried their by the various taxi drivers.

02 - Asleep

Huacachina is a beautiful little town nestled beside a small lagoon, surrounded by massive sand dunes. It's these dunes that draw huge crowds of travelers for activities such as dune buggy driving and sand boarding. Having just recently done dune bashing in Dubai we opted for the sand boards and eagerly began to run up the soft sand. About one minute and ten meters later up we were both out of breath, our calves and thighs burning. This was no fun! Where were the ski lifts to take you to the top? After about half an hour we managed to make our way about half way to the top of a dune, giving us a pretty long run down. Megan decided to go first and headed off down the slope ending up at the bottom with sand in just a few unmentionable places. Then came Rick's turn and as he came flying down he took a huge stack and came up covered from head to foot in sand. He claims he did it on purpose for effect! Luckily it was captured on film by Megan and is going into funniest home videos. After about an hour and a half of climbing up and whizzing back down we returned the boards and relaxed by the pool at the hostel.

03 - Paddle Boats

As the sun began to set we grabbed a few cervezas and gave our legs another (burning) work out climbing once again to the top of the sand dunes. It was a fantastic place to watch the sun set over the picturesque town, a fantastic end to a fantastic day.

04 - Dunes at Huacachina

05 - Rick Sandboarding

06 - Covered in Sand

07 - Megan Sandboarding

08 - Exhausted

09 - Dunes

10 - Us Sandboarding

11 - Megan Sandboarding

12 - Our Path

13 - Dunes

14 - Huacachina

15 - Rick and His Beer

16 - Top of the Dune

17 - Dune in Ica

18 - Sunset

19 - Top of the Dune

20 - Sunset

21 - Sunset on the Dune