Huacachina y Nazca
Huacachina
Wake up early.Go back to sleep.
Wake up again.
Go back to sleep.
Wake up again.
This has got to stop.
Internet, I AM A SANDBOARDER!!! Huacachina is a small lagoon surrounded by ginormous sand dunes, the kind of sand dunes that show up in Webshots. Our LOUD hostel rents us some sandboards, and up we climb. Up we climb. Up we climb. Up we climb.
And then we whooooosh down the dunas. Sandboarding is awesome. When you are standing, strapped into the board, you just feel cool. Alternative-hip cool. And then when you can stay standing while your board drags your body down the hill, you feel even cooler. Despite the fact that I collect several cups of sand in my shoes, socks, and pants, the experience is AWESOME.
Pulse after climbing dunas:
Adina: 132
Wade: 120
After two runs (really, there was no way I could claw my way up those heights again), we leave the hostel. I repack my bag. In the trash go my tennis shoes. They were really old Pumas, and they did me well. I brought them on this trip because I knew I could toss them along the way without regret. Sadly, the medicine tupperware got the axe as well. It was just too bulky and heavy. I don't know what I was thinking when I packed my three point one ounces of medicine in a two pound plastic box. Sorry Abbey, I'll make it up to you.
We take a taxi to Ica and catch a combi to Nazca just as it is leaving. The luck gods, they are with us again. Although this combi contains less than twenty-one people, it is still a nueva experience because we get to ride up front with the driver. And with our packs. It is a bit squishy. Wade is nearly sitting on the stick shift.
Nazca
We intend to get out of the combi to climb up the mirador and try to see the Nazca lines. Oops, we miss it. The combi just keeps on driving, and it's not like we have asked to be let off at a well-marked spot. We also can't do much, like request to turn around and find our spot, since there are at least fifteen other people in the vehicle. We content ourselves with our view from the window, which is not much. We can sort of make out that there may be rocks pushed around on the pampa floor, but by no means can we distinguish shapes.In Nazca, we walk back and forth between bus companies comparing prices and departure times. We would like to bus out of here to Arequipa overnight. The buses in this country are all privatized, so there are always many options. You have to shop around. We walk back and forth for half an hour, with our packs, past the same restaurants. And each time, the same Peruvians call out to us to patronize their shop. Cheap! Americans! Ten Soles! For you, eight Soles! Lady! Each time, we are not interested. We eventually settle on Ormeno business class, which promises reclining seats and a bathroom. The bus leaves at ten pm, which gives us enough time to eat, internet, and return to the mirador.
In one of the bus stations, we speak to two travelers who have just flown over the Nazca lines. They are incredibly airsick, and I am SO glad that we opted not to spend money on a plane ride. It is here that we also meet our first American friend, a Californian, no less.
The convenience store we choose is decidedly not near the yelling Peruvians. An old lady and a fat man attempt to serve us, but they apparently don't know Spanish. We ask for very simple things, a single Don Isaac and a single Inka Cola (they are both yellow soft-drinks), and we are given very different items, like plantains and cookies.
We sit on a divider in the middle of the road. This is our favorite spot to rest, in between cars and far from proprietors. On the sidewalk next to us, a man is shimmying up an electric pole with a rope harness he tied himself. He is putting up a wire all by himself. While watching him, I taste my first plantain. It tastes just like a banana. I am a teensy bit disappointed by this, since it is so much larger and pinker than a banana. It is rather phalic, in fact, and we make appropriately crude comments and poses about the fruit. Of course we also take pictures.
the great taste-off
Inka Cola is a bright yellow, bubble-gum flavored soft drink. It is the Bebida Nacional of Peru. It is more popular than Coca Cola in this country. It is at once both disgusting and delicious. It has many, many knock-offs.One knock-off that we keep seeing on the southern coast is called Don Isaac. We think this is hilarious, because who names a soda after a person? And who the hell is Don Isaac? Not exactly a Peruvian name. Not so much a Spanish name, either. Don Isaac is half the price of Inka Cola, and exactly the same highlighter hue. We purchase a bottle of each.
We open the bottles and toast. We count down from three, and take a sip of one. Then we take a sip of the other. Then we go back to the first. And to the second. We intertwine arms and sip, as if we are holding champaign glasses at our wedding. Or shot glasses at a skanky bar. We pose the bottles together and take pictures. THEY TASTE IDENTICAL.
Thus we spend our afternoon, drinking yellow soda and eating pan con manjar,. The manjar has become our chief condiment, nay, our cheif entree. I know it is only sugar and milk, but boy, is it good. And boy, is it plentiful here.
how to spot an Israeli
MEN:- have longer hair than usual
- wearing a headband
- sunglasses pushed up over head like headband
- small shirt than normal, often a sports jersey type, also often sleeveless
- short shorts
- man purse
- really long hair
- with an Israeli man
Nazca lines
We hitch to the mirador. We don't actually stand there on the side of the street holding out a thumb or a forefinger. We are walking on the street in Nazca, and a man next to a vehicle asks if we are going to the lines, and we say yes. We agree on a price of four Soles, and he shows us to his car, where five other gentleman are already sitting. We get it, squished in the back. I am obviously the on-the-lap-so-everyone-can-fit girl, and obviously I am not sitting on a strange Peruvian man's lap, I sit on Wade's lap. Only once we are out of the city and on the PanAmerican Highway in wilderness does it occur to the two of us that we have basically hitched a ride, and that we would NEVER do something like this back in the States. We would NEVER get in a car with strangers, we would NEVER not put on our seatbelts, we would NEVER enter a minivan with more than seventeen people on it, etc. But it just makes sense here. Perhaps because there was an exchange of money, perhaps because the car already had several passengers, perhaps because we are traveling and having ADVENTURES, who knows.Once at the mirador, we marvel at our surroundings. We are in the middle of a desert, with reddish mountains to one side, flatland on the other, and a narrow strip of highway in the middle going on and on and on. This highway is the PanAmerican, a road that stretches from the very bottom of Chile all the way to the top of Columbia, into Central America, and perhaps even across the border into one of our interstates. It is a long, long stretch of highway, and a road trip destination for the incredibly dedicated. Here, it is only two lanes -- one in each direction -- paltry, compaired to the 405 or 101 that stretch across California. And after our car drives on, empty. We cross it slowly, then run the other way, then stand in the middle and laugh.
We climb the mirador, which is a small hilly mound maybe three stories high. From the top, we can sort of make out some lines that stretch into the distance, and we can tell that way in the distance the lines twist around a make a shape, but that's about it.
While one the mirador, we meet some Japanese boys. Turns out they are on our bus tonight! There is also a small TV crew at the base of the mirador, and the boys tell us that the girl they are filming is a famous TV star. We saw a celebrity! In Peru!
We get back to the city by riding with one of the Japanese guys. All the internet places report that the net is down in Nazca. We have and early pizza (con palta, how wierd) at Julio's resturaunt. When we are done, the internet is back, and we do that for a bit. We have our first taste of the excellent SUBLIME chocolate bar, and go wait at the bus station.
the awful bus ride
THE BUS RIDE IS AWFUL.After the first hour, I need to go pee. I walk to the back of the bus, but cannot open the door. I return to my seat, thinking I can wait a bit until the person comes out. Half and hour later, after no one has emerged, I make Wade come with me to pry open the door. It is definitely locked. We go back to our seats. Another half hour passes, and the pee urge is so strong that I can't go to sleep. We walk to the front of the bus to ask the busdriver about the locked bathroom. He claims it is open. We argue. He says the bathroom stop is in five minutes. We return to our seats. I have to go so bad, but what can I do?
FIFTY MINUTES LATER, we finally pull over to the side of the road, in some shanty town in the middle of nowhere, next to a small shack. I RUN behind the shack and pee. It is delicious. When I get back onto the bus, the driver shows us that the bathroom door is open. I think he is a lier, I think he unlocked it just then. No matter, I was finally able to fall asleep.
We twist and turn and flop all over each other, trying to find a mutually comfortable positionfor the night. I drift in and out of sleep. Hours later, I awake and realize I am a bit nauseas. I take another Drammanine, but I cannot sit in our seat, in the middle of the bus, in the darkness, for very much longer. I walk up to the front of the bus, where fresh air is wafting in from the driver's compartment. I stand in the aisle, where I can look through his window at the road ahead. I don't normally get carsick, but we have been driving on a twisty highway at high speeds in the dark for hours. Up at the front, actually seeing the road ahead, my stomach is quieted. I watch our driver (the same driver for the whole twelve hour trip) swerve around steep ocean cliffs. I notice his speedometer, which indicates that he is driving TWICE THE SPEED LIMIT. Eventually the drugs kick in, and I fall asleep on the double seats in the second row.
In the morning, when the bus stops, I find Wade again, and we discuss how aweful this bus ride was. For me, it was more the length and the twistyness and the location of our seats. He cannot stop talking about how I had to wait to go to the bathroom for TWO HOURS. He says it like that, I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU WERE WAITING TO GO THE BATHROOM FOR TWO HOURS. Days later, when we are in Arequipa and even again in Puno, he mentions is again, I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU HAD TO WAIT TWO HOURS. Like it was the craziest thing that ever happened. I suppose if a boy had to pee so bad, he would just stick it out the window and go.
We agree that on our next overnight bus, we will treat ourselves to Royal Class, where the seats recline fully and there are two bathrooms.
Question of the Day: Name one quality of Peruvians you like, and one quality you don't. (Not truly a question, but it begs an answer, so there.)
Wade: He likes that Peruvians have no shame, and he doesn't like that they all have gaps in their teeth.
Adina: I like that they love talking to tourists, and I don't like all the litter.
(My first response was that I loved all the pineapple products in this country, but it was pointed out to me that that is not a quality of Peruvians.)
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