This morning we took a boat tour to the Bellastas Islands. Bellastas means arch. On one island there was a huge candelabra drawn on the side; no one knows how long it has been there, but it may be linked to the Nazca lines. It never rains here, so it lasts forever, hundreds or thousands of years. Then there were islands full of birds: pelicans, terns, cormorants, etc. Thousands of them. And humboldt penguins. And sea lions frolicking or fighting, or just laying sunning themselves. There were starfish clinging to the rock at the water line.
Workers live on these islands for months at a time collecting guavo (bird poop) for fertilizer. They use pick axes to scrape it off the rocks, put it in bags, and zipline it down to the boats.
After our boat tour, Pabel and our new tour-guide-of-the-day Jorge took us to the Paracas National Reserve. It is one big desert along the coast. Desolate and beautiful and vast. The road we took was made of salt. We had warm and cold currents fighting each other. There were fossils, and a beach where paragliders were catching the currents and gliding back and forth. One really cool thing was driving through the caldera of a volcano long filled in with sand, but we could see a giant rim around us. We stopped at one beach for the view, and a fast moving rogue wave got our socks and shoes and shorts all soaked. Glad we brought an extra pair of shoes while these dry out!
We were all quite pink and red from the sun and wind of the desert, which made us all sleepy. Until Pavel decided to take us for a joyride over a sanddune. We were glad there was no one coming up the other side. At 3:00 we finally went for lunch along the pier, rather boardwalk style, complete with serenaders. We accidentally learned that you are not supposed to tip them until you want them to leave. Oops. Our cutlery for the meal came very fancy, each piece wrapped in a sheet of toilet paper, which handily served as your napkin later on.
Then a very long drive to the town of Nazca. We stopped in Ica along the way. Ica was destroyed by a huge earthquake in 2007, and just had another earthquake last week. We walked through the town square and Pavel treated us to some very delicious candies that we wish we could remember the name of.
Once we got to Nazca and our hotel, we had to be weighed for our flight tomorrow. We really couldn't figure out why they needed to know our ages too. At 8 pm we found a busy restaurant where the rest of the gang ordered dinner and we just had a piece of dessert. An early morning tomorrow.
Sent from my BlackBerry.
No comments:
Post a Comment