Peru - Lima, Pisco and desert safari

We arrived in Lima 2 weeks ago very late on Friday night with the tour starting on Saturday morning. From most of what we had all heard, Lima was not worth visiting and could be quite dangerous. I think we were all pleasantly surprised even though we only experienced Lima from the airport to the hotel, and then on Saturday morning when we walked to the main tourist waterfront area. there is a lot of police presence and a lot of ´westerners´walking around and we felt very safe. We didnt go to the old city area which is supposed to be very different to this Miraflores area but from what we saw we were impressed.

Our tour then started with a 3 hour public bus ride down the coast to Pisco. There is nothing in Pisco to see (especially after a massive earthquake 2 years ago which destroyed a lot of the city) but it was a base for us to visit the Ballestas Islands the next morning. We got to meet the rest of our tour group (we are 16 in total) while learning to make the local cocktail drinks.

The next morning we woke up early to catch the boat ride out to the islands. On the way we saw the "candelabra" or "cactus" (you can see in the background below) engrained in the mountains along the sea. This was done thousands of years ago and doesnt ever erode - another phenomenon like the Nazca lines

After disembarking we met the rest of of the tour group and headed to Nazca. on the way we stopped off for lunch in a desert oasis town where we rode in sand buggies and went sand duning down some massive dunes - good fun. You can see James in the second picture in action down the dune.

 View of the oasis from the sand buggies