After taking my detour into Bolivia, I ended up having only 4 days or so left in Peru, with many things on my to do list. I narrowed it down to 2 places. Lima, since of course I had to be there at the end to catch my flight, and Huacachina, since I just couldn't wait to hang out in that oasis town surrounded by sand dunes.
First stop, Huacachina, and it was just as awesome as I'd hoped. I arrived at the main hostel in the tiny oasis town, Casa de Arena, at 4:50pm, just in time to catch the evening dune buggy and sandboarding tour at 5. The other travellers told me to get the crazy driver, since he was way more fun. He was easy to spot, since he looked like a total badass, schwarzenager style. And boy was he crazy, speeding over the sand dunes, bouncing all over the place, making me fear for the dreaded rollover. Instead all I got was a great thrill ride and eyefulls and mouthfuls of sand.
After a dune buggy ride, it's time for some sandboarding! You can either ride it like a snowboard or just go down it on your stomach like a sled. Some of the sand dunes are huge and steep, and when you go down it straight on your stomach you gain way too much speed...quite thrilling. When you ride it like a snowboard it's a bit slower, and it requires a bit more skill that I have yet to master, but still a blast.
For a party hostel, the Thursday night was pretty dead, but I was exhausted anyway from La Paz and travelling. On Friday night I was definitely ready when the hostel opens a discoteca that's apparently very popular with the locals too, so it's quite the party....literally right next to the 18 person dorm rooms I was staying in. Not like the noise mattered, I stayed up all night anyway and missed my planned tour to the Ballista islands at 6:30am, totally worth it.
Earlier in the day, after a day of chilling in the sun and boating in the lagoon, we climbed up the dunes at sunset, and that's when we first saw the discoteca.
Our boat was the one on the left..."movidick"
Here you can see our hostel, with the entire ghetto looking roof part farthest from the street being the discoteca and the rest being the hostel with a pool and bar in the middle.
Yeah it was big. And the dunes were big too. Quite a workout to get up there, but totally worth it. We timed it perfectly to get a fantastic dune sunset and a quick run down the dunes at dusk.
View of the dunes from the hostel dorm
Back to Lima I went, and it was completely different than every other place in Peru, but that's because it was also the first big city I was in. The city and the people had a more modern look and feel, no more old Peruvian ladies carrying their babies on their back with a colorful scarf looking thing. It seemed like everyone's skin was a bit lighter too, when the entire south had a much darker and aged look.
Unfortunately I could only spend one real day in Lima, since I arrived in the evening and had to leave the next night for a redeye flight, but I got together with some other hostel folks and we had a nice tour around the town all day. The most exciting part of the day was when we tried to catch a cab to this ceviche restaurant we'd heard about. Ceviche is pretty much raw fish, scary to eat but quite tasty with how they prepare it. So the cab driver didn't know where this place was, so he kept pulling over and trying to ask people for directions, but we weren't being that successful. I pulled out my smartphone to gps it, but next thing we know we're driving down the street and 2 motorcycle cops come from the other direction and stop us. Our first thought was that we had too many people in the car, since we crammed 4 in the back and 1 in the front, but apparently they stopped him because we were about to go into a bad neighborhood and they were yelling at the cab driver for taking a bunch of gringos this way haha. After asking for our documents and figuring out the situation, the cops decided to take us to the restaurant themselves, since they knew where it was. Yeah we had a police escort.
One cop in the front
Peace bro, thanks for the escort.
Afterwards we walked the long way to our hostel, with some nice views of the beach and a dangerous stairway up the oceanside cliffs. Of course we dipped in cold ocean water for a moment.
The evening consited of going to this water fountain park, which was surprisingly impressive. There was a main fountain with a laser light show and dancing fountains, as well as one you could walk through and some you could just play in. We couldn't resist the temptation of getting wet because it looked like so much fun.
Well, that was the end of my Peru experiences, I feel like I've barely scratched the surface of this country. When you look at a map I've only explored the southern half, maybe 40% of the country, and even in that I didn't spend enough time. I have a feeling it'll be like this with many of the countries I visit...
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