Anne and Hugh´s Travel Diary - Nazca

 

We arrived late in the afternoon at the village of San Pablo to visit the Museo Maria Reiche. This is the former home, research base and now resting place of the German born Dr. Maria Reiche, Phd, who devoted her whole life to studying the Nasca Lines and fighting to get them protected and preserved for all time.

It is a fascinating place with copies of her original notes and diagrams on display, along with photos and graphs explaining how the Nasca constructed an underground irrigation system that fed a series of deep well water channels in the area.

The Museum was added onto her original one room house, which still contains the original furniture she used. If you look inside, it has been set up to show her (a sculptured manikin of her), sitting at her typewriter desk working, with all her sketchs and survey drawings (copies of the originals now stored in the Peruvian National Archives) hanging from the wall.

On the east side is a new gallery with Nasca Pottery and aerial photographs of the Nasca Lines.  In the garden at east end is the tomb where she was laid to rest after she passed away.

Her work was instrumental in getting the Nasca Lines recognised as a World Heritage Site.

From here it was a short drive up out of the valley this small museum and town was in, out onto the broad flat Nasca Plains.  Here we stopped at a viewing tower set up to allow people to look down on the Nasca Hands and the Nasca Bush.

This is one of the driest places on the Earth.  It has not rained on these plains for centuries, which is why the Nasca Lines have lasted such a long time.  Recently there was an unseasonal heavy rain storm in the hills to the east.  The flash flood that resulted from this deluge did do some damage, which the aerial photos I took next morning will show.

We then proceeded south east to the City of Nasca, arriving just after sunset.  Our hotel here was a Casa Andrea, quite lovely and comfortable.

After checking in we went out to a local restaurant for supper before turning in for the night.

Good night to all from Nasca, Peru

Read more about the mysterious Nazca Lines here http://www.escapedtonazcalinestours.com/

Peru Tours - 5 Unmissable Places To Include In Your Trip

If you’re planning a Peru vacation, there’s a couple of places that you really shouldn’t miss - especially if this is your first trip to Peru. Here are 5 place in Peru that you should include in your Peru tour plans.

1) Machu Picchu
Everyone has heard of the world famous UNESCO World Heritage site, and you’ve probably seen the picture of the impressive Inca ruins rising out of the cloud forest. No matter how many times you’ve seen the image, nothing compares to actually standing and looking down over the site. If you really want to go for the traditional Machu Picchu experience, try to book yourself onto the Inca Trail, a four day trek that follows a 500 year old Inca path and finishes at the site.

2) Amazon Jungle
Half of Peru is covered by the Amazon Rainforest which provides a home to the greatest concentration of animal and plant life on earth and incredible bio-diversity. The main areas that are visited by travelers are the Tambopata and Iquitos regions which can be reached relatively easily. The Peruvian Rainforest is a truely spectacular environment even if you are not a complete animal or bird enthusiast!

3) Nazca lines
Best seen from a light aircraft, the Nazca lines are a set of ancient drawings on the surface of a desert in southern Peru  that range from simple lines to complex images like monkeys and spiders. Some figures are more than 200m across, and archaeologists are still debating hotly as to the origin and purpose of these mysterious lines as they can only really be fully viewed while flying!

4) Lake Titicaca
This lake sits 3,811m above sea level and is the largest lake by volume of water in South America and is shared with Bolivia. Visitors can navigate the lake by small boat and visit the various islands dotted around it’s vast area, as well as paying a visit to the famous Uros floating reed islands made by the inhabitants who still to this day live and work on their self-constructed homes.

5) Colca Canyon
The second deepest canyon in the world (the deepest being the Cotahuasi next door), Colca Canyon offers visitors the opportunity for some spectacular hiking and other adventure and cultural activities. It’s also recognized as one of the best places to see the famous Andean condor, the largest land bird in the world with a wingspan of 3.2 metres.

Visiting all 5 sites
Depending on the time constraints of your vacation, it’s possible to visit all these sites as part of the same trip. However, to do this independently normally requires a lot of time to organize transport and travel between the different sites (many of which are hundreds of miles apart) let alone sort out logistics once you arrive. If you are planning on taking a Peru vacation where you have less than a couple of weeks to play with and want to see this top 5 it is generally advisable to book with a Peru tour operator.

Have you visited any of the sites mentioned above? What other spectacular places would you recommend for Peru vacations

Author: Gary Sargent - Escaped to Peru / Escaped to Latin America

Four Incredible Peru Travel Experiences

There are innumerable travel experiences that one can have visiting Peru from the dry coastal regions to the towering Andes containing Machu Picchu, all offering a unique, unforgettable vacation. This article will describe four fantastic travel experiences that you can have in Peru.

Exploring the legacy of the Incas
Your first experience is a tour of the heart of Inca territory. It starts in the city of Cusco, which is considered an impressive city with its mix of Spanish colonial and Inca architecture. It was once the center of the Inca Empire that covered what is now Peru, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia and the southern part of Colombia. You take a tour of this city before heading to the depths of the Sacred Valley of the Incas. While in the Sacred Valley, you will ascend the ruins of the military outpost of Ollantaytambo and meander through the market of Pisac. Once done exploring the Sacred Valley, the next stop is Aguas Calientas and the wonders of Machu Picchu. Due to its almost impossible location, Machu Picchu was protected from Spanish conquest. It remains as one of the best-preserved and impressive reflections of the Inca Empire.

Riding high in the Mountain ranges Of Peru
A trip to the Peruvian Andes has many awe-inspiring and magical sites. This trip starts in Arequipa, known as “the White City” and then travels to Colca Canyon to enjoy the hot springs and witness the flying condors and incredible panoramas. Then it is off to Puno to tour the wonderful and magnificent Lake Titicaca, a sacred place for the Inca civilization; Incan mythology tell us that Manco Capac, the first Incan king, was born here. According to Incan legend, this is the place from which the world was created, when the god Viracocha came out of the lake and created the sun, the stars and the first people. You will have many places to discover on the shores of Lake Titicaca, as well as on the islands that lie within the lake.

Jungle boogie
The Peruvian Amazon is also a place not to miss. The Amazon is a beautiful rainforest displaying an intricate balance of life with a lush ecosystem. When you visit the Amazon, you will encounter some of the thousands of species of flora and fauna that live there.

Ancient culture and impressive wildlife; the coast of Peru
Another incredible tour is to visit the Nazca Lines, Paracas National Park and the Ballestas Islands. Starting from Paracas, it is one of the best marine reserves in the world with the highest concentration of marine birds. This is followed by a motorboat excursion to the Ballestas Islands which have numerous arches and caves created by erosion that provide shelter for thousands of seabirds and sea lions. The islands have been called the “Galapagos of Peru”. Once you have visited the islands, you can travel by air over the famous Nazca lines, huge parallel and geometric line figures, as well as designs such as an enormous monkey, a dog, a bird with a wing span of over 100 meters, a spider and a tree cut into the stony desert. It is thought that these lines are representative of a vast astronomical pre-Inca calendar.

Between Cusco, Mach Picchu, the Andes, the Amazon, the Nazca lines and the Ballestas Islands, you will have found some incredible Peruvian travel experiences that will be long remembered.

Author: Gary Sargent - Escaped to Peru / Escaped to Latin America

Peruvian Coastal Deserts - The Sechura and the Atacama

Peru is a country of extremes, extremes in culture, language, history, architecture, flora, fauna and most noticeably, landscapes. Over half the country is Amazon Jungle, you have the spine of the mighty Andes mountains and finally the thin coastal strip of desert running the whole length of the country. Starting at the northern border in the Piura region the desert spreads out from the coast between 20 to 100 kilometers to the Andes mountains. This northern part is known as the Sechura Desert and runs just from the city of Piura to the Tumbes - Piura equatorial dry forests. The desert covers a total area of 188,735 square kilometers.

The Peruvians call only this northwestern portion of the coast the Sechura Desert while other sources, such as the World Wildlife Fund, consider the Sechura Desert to be the entire land mass of coastal desert from the most northwestern part of Peru connecting to the Atacama Desert in northern Chile. The coastal area of southern Peru below Nazca is considered to be part of the Atacama Desert by the National Geographic Society, so definitions vary, but the sand doesn’t!

The Sechura Desert in the North is relatively wet and vegetated compared to the Atacama which is reputed (by NASA) to be the driest place on the planet. In 1998 the climatic phenomenon known as El Nino, which originate along this coast and affects weather patterns around the world periodically, cause unusually heavy rains making rivers bordering the desert to burst their banks and empty into the Sechura desert, forming the second largest body of water in Peru after Lake Titicaca. This freshwater lake was 90 miles long, 20 miles wide and 10 feet deep, with occasional domes of sand and clay appearing above the surface. Shrubs and scrub still continue to cover large portions of the desert as a result.

Due to the environmental effects of the nearby Pacific Ocean, the Sechura Desert has a very low temperature range. However, it is one of the most arid on the Earth because of cold coastal waters and subtropical atmospheric subsidence. During the summer months of December through March, the temperature ranges from 25°C to 38°C, with the average being over 24°C. During the winter months, the weather is cloudy and cool with temperatures ranging from 16°C during the night and 24°C during the day.

Human settlements have been able to develop in the Sechura Desert due the many short rivers that cross it coming down from the glaciers and rains in the Andes. One early urban culture was the Moche which ate guinea pigs, fish, peanuts and squash and built huge mud brick cities, the largest of which still survives in part, Chan Chan near the city of Trujillo. Around 800 to 1300 A.D the Sicas succeeded the Moche and were known for their lost wax casting of gold which were greatly prized by the Spanish Conquistadors.

More than 1,500 miles of desert continues south until the Sechura Desert reaches the Atacama Desert belonging to Chile and Peru. This land is extremely barren with a few rocky brown hills but was also home to ancient civilizations such as the Nazca with their impressive Nazca Lines, aquaducts and mud cities.

West of the Andes Mountains in the South of Peru and into Chile, covering a 600 mile strip of land on the Pacific coast, is the Atacama Desert. It gets very little rain as it is on the downwind side of the mountains. It is therefore one of the driest deserts in the world and covers an area of over 40,000 square miles made up primarily of sand, salt basins (called Salars) and lava flows. The area is littered with geysers and tourism has built up around 4x4 trips over the desert, with a number of luxury lodges and spas being built and this “otherworldly” landscape is sure to continue to draw visitors from all over the world.

Author: Gary Sargent - Escaped to Peru / Escaped to Latin America