Ica and the Icky Toes

Ica and the Icky Toes

Olivia climbing one of the massive sand dunes

Considering Nazca didn't have a centralized terminal, simply ticket offices, our journey to Ica was surprisingly easy. We took the same bus we had taken the day before to view the Nazca lines from the Marie Reich Tower, but instead of getting off we continued forwards. The main awkwardness was that they rushed us onto a bus right after we had bought ice cream, surprisingly there was only one ice cream/body part dip. But we trundled along in the bus, watching the usual odd collection of films. This time we seemed to have opted away from the graphically violent films (some prison boxing films and war films) but instead had the odd children's horror type films of Goosebumps and Nightmare before Christmas, yes it would appear that has started here too.

The many palm trees of Huacachina

We finally arrived at the Soyuz bus terminal after about two, maybe three hours. We disembarked and were greeted by the usual shouts of 'Friend! You want a taxi!' while we were trying to wade through to retrieve our bags. Finally we pushed through the crowds and emerged outside where we were once more offered a taxi and were in the frame of mind to negotiate the price. For although we were heading to stay in Ica, our final destination was on the outskirts of the city in a place called Huacachina which is a small oasis in the desert (the same desert as San Pedro), shadowed by sand dunes and palm trees. Our price was fixed and the man took us towards his car, despite saying taxi thoughts raced through my head that we would end up in one of the moto scooters, thankfully this was not the case, yet...

The Lagoon

As I have said Huacachina is a lagoon in the desert. It has been featured in a number of high profile positions. One such use was on the bag of the 50sol note but most now appear to be a temple in Huaraz. The other place it has appeared is in the iPhone X video where scenery from around the Oasis is used. There is a legend of how the Oasis appeared which is as follows. There was once a pretty princess who decided to have a bath, she removed her clothes and upon doing so noticed a hunter in her mirror. In her shock and horror of being caught with her pants literally down she fled the scene. Her mirror was left behind which became the water of the lagoon, although this does beg the question of what she was bathing in if the mirror became the water. Other versions describe how the water she was bathing in became the lagoon and the folds of her cloak became the sand dunes. Other people say that she lives on as a mermaid in the lagoon. The legend also states that she claims one man as a victim every year. As you can tell by my writing of this, I was not claimed, although one website simply blamed this on poor swimming from the Peruvian population.

Olivia at the top of a Sand Dune

So our taxi pulled up at the street where we could descend towards the lagoon. Our door was not even open and we had two people trying to sell us tours, this was indicative of what was to come. As it turns out Huacachina is very very touristy and consists of lots of peddlers and tour companies wandering around the lagoons trying to get you to buy Dune Buggy Tours or Quad Bike tours. We politely dismissed them and pushed on towards our accommodation. Unfortunately our accommodation couldn't take us in until 3:00pm when the room was ready so we went to find somewhere to eat. I know shame, but we had some nice Broaster Chicken, which is like Peruvian KFC and a burger with some delicious Passion Fruit juice and then after that we could check in. We do find it really strange how Passion Fruit is a rarely seen thing in England, but when it is seen it is quite costly. Yet here in Peru the solution is to give away a free drink made of passion fruit.

The numerous rolling Sand Dunes

We had two days in Huacachina so decided we would make the most of it. We walked around the lagoon on our day of arrival, an arduous task that took nearly a whole ten minutes and then decided to just enjoy the sunshine and ridiculously loud music that was playing in the evening.

Olivia's whopper of a pancake, stuffed with fruit, my breakfast wasn't as interesting....

Our next day we were a little more adventurous and headed to look at the views of the sand dunes. Now it's worth mentioning at this point that the sand dunes are essentially mountains made out of sand, I know this is obvious, but it makes me feel better for the next bit I'm going to say. We made it most of the way up one and it took a while. The sun was hot, the sand was hotter and we finally made it up enough to enjoy a view and then could face no more. But the sand gets everywhere! it blows off the top of the dune into any possible opening there is, eye, ear, mouth, you name it, there was sand. But we managed to climb enough of it to get the view before heading back to chill out for a while.

The desert

Our final day before departure was our most exciting day. We decided that we didn't want to take a buggy ride across the sand dunes, let's be honest if you're in for a thrill seeking, adrenaline fueled ride your best bet is a taxi in Cusco... So we headed towards some of the stalls to rent a sand board, Olivia was apprehensive and we'd heard in San Pedro that it can be a draining experience so we decided that we would rent one. It is worth pointing out here the amazing price we got, 4 sols for 90 minutes of sand boarding! This is about £1 for the amount of sand boarding you'll probably want to do unless you're some sort of Olympian, it's not like there are lifts to take you up the dunes.

Olivia using the board to aid her climb

So we hired a board and took off up the dunes, and found an incline that didn't seem too steep so as to get our bearings. To give you some background on our extreme sports backgrounds, Olivia spent a ski season in Montgenevre in France before we met. I have snowboarded on occasion, but am far from being a great snowboarder. I did however have a trump card up my sleeve. When I was in year five, my friends and I decided to use a broken skateboard, essentially a board without the wheels, to go down a slope that was slick with mud. Our mudboarding escapades weren't appreciated by all, my teachers were furious at the amount of mud we were covered in. Oddly my mum wasn't as filled with rage as I thought she would be and simply laughed it off. But it was good practise.

Waxing or Brown Out?

The first incline wasn't amazing. Sand is more gritty than snow so you have to wax the board, we had a candle to do this with, and it was slow progress down with lots of hopping to get it to work, the board and bindings were also a little small for my large feet, but we moved to a bigger dune and that's when the fun really started. I tried first and took off, only falling down about four times down the slope, it wasn't a very long slope... thankfully the phone's video didn't work at this point due to limited memory so Olivia doesn't have my spectacular fails on camera. One in particular was when I managed to miss the binding and went flying down the slope in a true Eddie the Eagle style.

Top of the second incline

Olivia sledged down that slope, sand spraying behind her in a big plume. We did get better though, I think I even made it to the bottom once without falling over. Although one part of the slope in particular dipped just below the line of sight of where Olivia was sitting when I managed to crash out. I'm unfamiliar with the terminology for this, in Snowboarding I'd describe it as a white out, but sand isn't white and a brown out doesn't sound good... But anyway, at that point despite the hard thud in the sand I decided to leap up with my arms in the arm and shout 'I'm okay!' unfortunately, Olivia did not see this, but the random woman walking past did. This was almost as bad as when the wax ran out on the board and I juddered to a halt, stuck in the sand and not moving I decided to mime riding a bit. A wise-crack passerby with a camera thought this would be a fantastic opportunity for him to take a load of photos, I'm still waiting on my commission.

Olivia Sledging

All in all it was fair to say that we really enjoyed the sand boarding. I originally thought ninety minutes would be too short, but it was about the right time for us mere novices. It takes a lot more effort to maneuver the board and climb up the slopes than it does with snowboarding.

Getting better

In all Huacachina was a lot of fun, we swam a little, ate a bit and sand boarded. We leave with happy memories of the place and sand in every crevice (I'd like to say that is metaphorical, but unfortunately one of my 'brown outs' ended up feeling a bit more like a sand enema). I think we both felt that Huacachina was quite touristy and thus overpriced, but it is certainly quite pretty once you get away from right next to the lagoon. I think ultimately the lagoon part had a lot of touts constantly harassing you, a fair bit of rubbish around it and also a massive pump in to it. As it turns out local landowners have built too many wells and started to drain the lagoon. This means they are pumping water in until a more permanent solution can be found. I guess the lagoon is ultimately a great source of income for them. I'd say two to three days is plenty of time and worth a visit, any longer and I think the sense of enjoyment would be overshadowed by annoyance.

Dancing when she stopped

In the next few weeks we are moving quite rapidly, only spending a day or two in small villages as we head up into Ecuador. We will write soon about Trujillo but after that we will probably lump one or two destinations in Ecuador together. Until next time.

My legs after the whole experience

What now?
See some more of our posts

• Overview
• European Ecstasy
• Adventures in Asia
• Pacific Paradise
• Southern South American Splendour
• Central Celestial Scenes
• Incan Delights

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