Peru IV

Huacachina

Around 1h bus drive away from Paracas lies the weirdest thing in the desert. A beautiful oasis surrounded with palm trees. It's a really cool place. Such a different scenery. We took a few hour buggy and sand boarding tour to the sand dunes. Full of adrenaline and vertigo feeling :)  

 Sand as far as an eye can see. In the distance lies Ica town.

 Family photo goals!

We drove around in buggys like these. Amazing!

See that buggy on top of a sand dune on the right. That was us. And it was steep! Luckily the drivers are really experienced, some more adventurous than others though. The sand boarding was so much fun aswell. Head first down the dunes! A bit scary first time but they show you how to brake yourself and there's nothing to be afraid of :) 

I loved taking photos of the sand dunes, especially when the sun was setting and creating shadows. 

Huacachina lagoon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huacachina

There's plenty of hotels and hostels to stay and during the day it's really relaxing to just stroll around the lagoon and enjoy the peace and quiet there.

 Recreational activities on the lagoon

 Sandboards for rent. You don't need to go for a buggy&sandboarding tour,  you can just rent a board and climb up the dunes yourself.

Mancora

Our last week in Peru was spent in a chilled surf town up north. We stayed in a Balinese look-a-like bungalow place called Kimbas Bungalows Mancora. We absolutely loved it. Beautiful greenery, small pool, wonderful friendly stuff. I even managed to join the owner for yoga sessions :)

 Can you see this bright green iguana? Pretty isn't he!

 The town is famous for surfing and kite surfing. The water is safe to swim any time. On weekends it gets busyer with the locals.

 Ben practising.

 If watersports are not your kind of a game, there's horse riding on the beach available :) 

 The main catholic church in Mancora. 

 The most common transport in Mancora - tuk-tuks

 Underwater graffiti

 Basic bungalows by the sea

 Dinner for one?

 So we took a tuk-tuk ride to the beaches South of Mancora. Really quiet there. Hotels scattered around the coastline. Hardly anyone around. And we sat down in a restaurant, only one more table there besides us and voila a turtle comes up to the beach to start laying his eggs. How wonderful. I have seen this before in Costa Rica but only at night time. It was truly magical moment and we felt really lucky to be there and witness it.

 Next moment I spot a massive humpback whale in the distance just breaching out as he is going along the coast. We saw him breaching out at least 15 times! Unfortunately my camera doesn't have the greatest zoom lens so picture doesn't do justice. But again, truly magical moment. 

Later I read that you can go on a whale watching tour in between August and November and they say there's 98% chance to see a whale. That's their migration route. Most hotels in Mancora can arrange you that and the boats leave from a nearby town called  Los Organos. Reading peoples blogs about it - its absolutely worth it if you are around that time of the year. 

If you take the trip to Mancora, whatever you do PLEASE-PLEASE DON'T SIGN UP FOR THE TURTLE SWIMMING TRIP!!! If you want to swim with turtles and with 50+ other tourists. Yes, you can do it and if you want to be responsible for disturbing their ecosystem by feeding and touching these turtles ... go ahead. The animals do not approach you because they want to be touched.... they approach you because there is food. This is not a wild life trip. Touching turtles is actually prohibited because people don't know how to touch. They tend to harass them, grab them, ride them, spin them and god knows what more. If you see one, just swim along with them and enjoy the moment.

 

 The next day we took a tuk-tuk to the natural mud baths nearby. Be warned it's very dry in Mancora. Like very very dry. That's why it can get really dusty with strong winds and the accommodation places seem to water everything now and again to rinse off the dust layer. 

 Nourishing our skins :)

 Again it was just us and our tuk-tuk driver. Gotta love these off the beaten track places. 

Mancora has the best, the best mango smoothies. I think I had minimum 3 a day. It's just lush. Just keep an eye on your drink as some other people might think it's theirs.... :)

There's so many reasons I like Peru.  It's just so colorful. Good food. Friendly people. Not tacky like some places in Asia. Easy to travel around (all you need is time). So many sights from the desert to the mountains to the sea and to the Amazonian jungle. South America, we will be back. This was just a start! Happy travels :)