Peru - Ica

Chile was all about flying around, due to it long shape.  In Peru we will be mainly bussing it around, and we just completed our first bus journey from Lima to Ica.  It was very comfortable, in a luxury bus for abut 4 hours. 

Ica is located in the middle of a desert. Completely surrounded by sand dunes.  Yet Ica has a lot of green space going for it, like an oasis.  It even produces wine… we have had better (and far worse!) 

The main attraction here was going to see the Ballesta islands, and the peninsula.  The peninsula has a petroglyph believed to be related to the Naszca lines, called the “Candelabra de Paracas”. It definitely resembles either a candle stick or a cactus, and is 181 meters tall, large enough to be seen almost 20km at sea.

The Ballesta islands, all 23 of them, are famous for its wildlife, and we got to see a LOT of Kelp seagulls and Guanay cormorants (very smelly birds which apparently produce a LOT of guano which is collected for fertiliser), Inca terns and even a couple of Humboldt penguins.  

There was even a beach with sea lions, many with small pups.  The girls thought that they were so cute and Maxine wanted to take one home (not happening).  It was also interesting seeing vultures mixed in with the sea lions.  We suspect that a couple of the pups might not be making it to adulthood…

Whilst at the port of Paracas, where our boat departed from, we came across a number of Peruvian Pelicans.  They are definitely smaller and more grey than the ones we are familiar with from Namibia. Very social birds, and people were able to get quite close to them on the beach sidewalk. 

We also went round on the huge peninsula, where we spent some time on the beach with the girls sticking their feet in the cold pacific sea.  One of the beaches had red sand, the only beach in Peru.  It was a very relaxing afternoon with a bit of water fun.