However we could travel to Peru!

Our travel to Peru was so troubled from the start, because our flight to London was canceled. We were desperate and we thought about canceling the trip, but then we decided to take tickets for an expensive flight and go to London, where we would have taken our flight to Lima.
Fortunately, we took our flight and, after 14 hours, we arrived in Lima where we took a taxi for our hotel.

We planned a ring trip: Lima, Paracas and its National Reserve and the Ballestas islands, the Huacachina oasis and surfing on the dunes, Nazca and its lines, Arequipa, the Colca canyon and the condors, Puno and the Titicaca Lake, Cusco and the Sacred Valley of the Incas, the rainbow mountains in Vinicunca and Machu Picchu; then we came back to Lima.

We always moved with busses that our contact, Casa Yolanda, booked for us in advance; she booked for us also the hotels and the excursions.

STAGE 1: PARACAS NATIONAL RESERVE AND THE BALLESTAS ISLANDS

"When you are going to Ballestas Islands, bring with you a hat!"

Our trip in Peru begins! When we left Lima and its very poor suburbs, we moved to Paracas in about four hours. We arrived at Paracas in the late afternoon; then we had dinner in front of the ocean and we had a good Pisco Sour, a typical drink.

The next day, our host took us to the port where we took a speedboat from the middle of the ocean. The weather wasn't good and it was cold and windy; fortunately, we wore warm clothes, so our life jacket is too tight.

We left the port and we went to the ocean; our guide showed us "The candlestick", a big picture in the rock that sailors used to orient themselves. Then we went to Ballestas Islands: they are little islands where sea lions, crabs, penguins and million birds live. These islands are called "Galapagos of the poor" because a lot of species live there. They became famous because here there are a lot bird poop and the humans use it like fertilizer.

I recommend this experience to all, in particular to animals lovers; it's fantastic see this animals closely and you can't forget this excursion if the bird poop hit you! Someone says it brings luck!

After this excursion, a guide brought us to visit the Paracas National Reserve. This is a beautiful land; the colors often change, the yellow sand becomes red and the blue and white sea crashes on the rocks. This is amazing!
Then the guide brought us to have lunch in a sailors village, in the Reserve. A ceviche for Matteo and some fired fish for me; these were some of the best fish dishes that we have ever eaten.

In the early afternoon, we took our backpacks and we went to our next destination: the Huacachina oasis.

STAGE 2: THE HUACACHINA OASIS

An oasis is a little town in the desert with a lake in the middle; the dunes of sand change their colors depending on the sunlight.
When we arrived by car, my dream about the oasis became a nightmare: it wasn't like oasis in the film, it wasn't a quite place. The people screamed like at the market, the tourists made photos everywhere and the cars were in every corner and they honk the horn in every moment... nothing special.

To be honest, at the first, i was disappointed. Fortunately, then we took our dune buggy and we went to the desert to do sandboarding. We did it on the sunset and it was amazing!

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If you ask Matteo, he will answer you that surf on the dunes was the most beautiful experience of our travel in Peru; i think it was very funny, exspecially with a ad driver like ours that drove his buggy at high speed!

At the end of the sunset, when the dunes were violet and the oasis became quiet and silent, we left this place and we went to a mysterious town: Nazca!

• However we could travel to Peru!
• Le linee di Nazca e un sorvolo difficile
• Arequipa: la città bianca nel cuore del Perù
• Colca Canyon e Chivay, la ciudad del sexo pt.1
• Colca Canyon e Chivay, la ciudad del sexo pt.2
• Il lago Titicaca e le isole Uros, Taquile e Amantani
• La città di Cusco e il mercato di Pisac
• Le montagne colorate del Perù: camminata a 5000 metri
• La valle sacra degli Inca: verso Machu Picchu
• Finalmente Machu Picchu, una meraviglia del mondo