Paracas, Huacachina and Nazca

From Lima we took a 5ish hour (I think? - all the bus journeys have rolled into one already!) bus to an area called Paracas, which is by the sea. Again this was just a 1 night stop before moving on to Nazca via Huacachina the next day. I’ll admit I’m already having a love/hate (mainly hate) relationship with my backpack so staying somewhere for just one night is slight effort. Even more annoying as the laundrette I took my clothes to in Lima has shrunk or dyed a load of my clothes but that’s another moan! Just an excuse to go shopping I guess?!

We arrived in Paracas just in time to catch sunset, which the Peruvians say is the best in the world on this coastline. I have to agree with them - it was pretty special. An added bonus was that a security guard let 6 of us into the 5* hotel’s private beach to watch it which was a much better view than from the public beach. We then went for dinner and drinks before calling a bit of an early night ready for 6am yoga on the beach. I’ll admit I’ve done yoga less than 5 times in my life and 2 of these times have been in the last 2 weeks. Who knows by the end of the trip I might be a Yogi?! Maybe not! 

After yoga we grabbed breakfast before heading out to the National Park. The best time to visit is in the morning before it gets cloudy in the afternoon. Some of the guys got quad bikes and 5 of us girls went in a van with our own driver/photographer! He drove us all around the National Park (which is basically a desert) stopping a various points along the way. My favourite stop, and the most popular being the Red beach. 

The next thing we planned was to go wine tasting on the way to Huacachina. We sampled over 10 different spirits and only 1 wine, but still it was a good experience. They love their Pico in Peru, it tastes like Tequila but worse. It’s nice in a cocktail but not straight! 

Huacachina is a tiny little town in the middle of the desert and it’s a hot spot for sand boarding and dune buggies. I sadly had to give sand boarding a miss due to my on going back injury, so the group went ahead without me but I still went for a walk up the sand dunes, in my converse!!! Worse decision ever... I could have made a small beach with the amount of sand I poured out of them after! Of course I wasn’t very prepared and everyone else was equipped with their balaclavas and goggles. I also went to the beautiful natural lagoon which is located right in the centre of the Huacachina desert before hoping on the bus to Nazca. The journey took about 2 hours and was probably one of the most scenic drives so far in South America. We continued through the desert then went through some mountains while the sun was setting over the nearby towns. 

During the day in Nazca I visited an old abandoned church which isn’t known by tourists so it was pretty amazing to have the whole place to ourselves. I couldn’t even tell you the name of it or where exactly it was. There was no entry fee or souvenir shops, just the Church. We went down into the catacombs as well as onto the not so stable roof!

Nazca is known by most for the ‘Nazca Lines’ rumoured to have been drawn by UFO’s amongst many other theory’s! There are many tour companies which sell flights over the lines to get the best view but as there is hundreds of them you wouldn’t be able to see them all anyway and it’s very pricey. Luckily for the budget travellers there is a tower just of the main highway you can go up and see some of the lines. At the mere cost of 3 sol which is about 70p! I waited in a queue with about 100 other tourists to climb the tower before heading to the desert to watch the sunset. We went for dinner before our next nightbus to Arequipa! 

Lima

I arrived into Lima (the capital of Peru) around 9am after a nearly 12 hour night bus with very little sleep. First impressions were that it was cold and a bit grey and there was the most amount of traffic I have ever seen in a city! I’d booked a free walking tour in the afternoon in the centre of Lima so a group of us decided to head into the centre and explore beforehand. We took the local bus down from our hostel which took around 40 minutes to get into the centre, the centre was how you’d expect any centre of a capital city to be - busy with lots of tourists! 

Of course a visit to a coffee shop was first on the list - Peru’s coffee is great, they rave about it loads here and it certainly lives up to expectations. We also paid a visit to the chocolate museum before the walking tour which was great for samples! The guide on the walking tour took us around the main sites of the city including the church, the main square and an area where there is no security/police and ‘anything goes’ - we all clutched onto our bags very tightly! 

The area our hostel was in was called Barranco. It was much nicer than the centre of Lima and was known as the hippy/edgy part of town - an added bonus was it was close to the sea. After the walking tour, in the evening we went for dinner and drinks in Barranco - there was a cute little fair on with clothes and food stalls and some live music. We ended up in a bar called Ayahuasca which was like a swanky central London speak easy bar, we went in and took one look at the drinks menu (which didn’t fit in with our travelling budget) and made a swift exit. Luckily happy hour was on in like every other bar so it was rude not go for a drink or 3! 

The next day some of us decided to be cultural and check out an Inca ruin about an hours walk from the hostel (which apparently used to look like the Pyramids) we had a guide lead us around and tell us all about how the Pyramids came to be there. Later on in the evening some of us went to watch the sunset before getting burritos for dinner and heading out to the local bars and a salsa club. Hopefully by the end of the trip I’ll actually be able to salsa (got a long way to go until then!!) 

 

 

The next day we took a stroll around Barranco to see some of the famous local street art before getting a 5 hour bus to our next destination! 

Huanchaco and Trujillo

I got a night bus to Huanchaco, which is another small beachside town further down the coast from Mancora. When I say small I mean you could walk from once side of the town to the other in around 15 minutes! It had 1 bakery, 1 supermarket but about 40 restaurants/cafes! I only spent 1 night (48 hours) in Huanchaco before getting another night bus in Trujillo to Lima (the Capital of Peru).

After breakfast a few of us spent the day at a local beach club in Huanchaco as the beach itself was far too windy to lie on. I tried to go into the sea but it was quite rough and probably left best to the professional surfers! We played beach volley ball and I even managed to fit in a beach run before spending the next day in the centre of Trujillo. We paid a visit to Chan Chan which was around a 10 minute bus ride from the hostel and is an Inca ruin. There is about 40 Inca ruins all over Peru but the main one of course being Machu Picchu.

Trujillo wasn’t really anything to rave about, spending the afternoon there was more than enough time! The town seemed strangely quiet and there wasn’t many tourists. I wondered around the main square and the centre of the city before having dinner and getting on the 10 hour night bus to Lima.