Day 11 – 16/08/09

LIMA, PERU

Peruvian Flag

Arrived in Lima at 3am after another flight delayed for 2 hours, also with no Visa card!!!! I’m going to try and defend myself (Rob) here, when receiving money from an ATM in Dublin or any big city in Europe the visa card comes out first from an ATM machine then the money then receipt!!! But not over here your money comes out first then your receipt then your card 15seconds later!! Enough time for me to walk off happy to get the money and leave my card in the machine!! I’m sure you can ALL totally understand how I did it!!! Luckily enough no money was taken and card was cancelled. Anyway, Danielle got us up at 8am to be down in reception to meet our group for a 35day trip from Lima to Santiago. Well at least Danielle thought it was 8am it was really 7am so we were waiting down in reception for a half hour till we realized!! This was a much more serious note then the Visa card!!
We met Alex our tour guide and our small group, Sian(English), Abbey(Aus) and Diane(Kiwi) yes all girls!!! (I now know how you feel Conor) all very nice people. We took a small tour around Lima with our group and we saw the coolest dog in Lima. (below)

Coolest dog in Lima

Again another city I thought was going to be small and have no shop fronts and people begging and again I was wrong.
We made our way to the bus station were we had a 4 hour trip to Pisco for a boat ride to Ballestas Islands and some sand boarding!!


Day 12 – 17/08/09

PISCO

Local Taxi in Pisco (Tuk Tuk)

Our Hotel in Pisco(had an earth quake 2 years ago)

An early start to the day, out by 7 to catch a bus to the port, so that we could head out to the Paracas National Reserve (The Peruvian Galapagos) - a boat tour of the Ballestas Islands. We got the worst seats on the boat, right at the back breathing in the fumes and we couldn’t hear the tour guide, but we figured out what he was saying. We got to see loads of birds, sea gull, penguins, sea lions and dolphins! It was a pretty good sight but not really our thing – one funny fact though was that every 7 years locals come out to collect bird shit….. it can reach 2 meters high in that space of time – and is used for fertiliser!!

Freeeeezing!! This isn't cruelty its a Pervian dog (voted ugliest dog in the world)

Thought to be spiritual guides in Peru!!!

After lunch we headed by bus to Huacachina where we got to go sand boarding and race around in sand buggies!! This was so much fun; firstly it was sunny and warm!! Yippy!

Group Shot!

We headed off in a buggy – fully strapped in for a crazi ride over the sand dunes, it was like being in a roller coaster - a dodge viper 8 cylinder engine belting it around this vast desert!! Then the driver would bring us to the top of a sand dune and give us a waxed up board and push us off!! You go on you belly, elbows in (to prevent sand burn) and either feet down to control the pace or like Rob feet up and free fall down the slope and skim across the flat sand like a rocket!! So much fun, I did eventually pick up the courage to lift up my feet and my god you literally fly down, such a rush! We went to 4 different slopes each got harder but more fun!

Then we headed off in an ‘American Taxi’ – Cadalac – to Nazca. Our driver was so funny, once he saw Rob falling a sleep he started to sing really loud, it was great entertainment though – check out the video! Along the way we got to view some of the Nazca Lines at sunset from a high tower – Alex told us some of the theories as to how they got there… Rob is cynical and doesn’t believe, I’m still on the fence about it we’ll have to wait til tomo!!