Pisco (San Martin), Peru - Islas Ballestas & Nazca Lines

Thursday March 8

We were up at 5:00 to be off the ship at 7:00. We had to collect our passports for our over-land. The lady at the desk looked through her small box of passports for those of us on independent over-lands (not booked through Princess) and she didn't have them. She called someone and they couldn't find it and told her to check her box again. She did and she called them back. That went on for quite some time back and forth her rechecking her box and calling them back again. I went back upstairs to gather our things together and Greg didn't come back up for another 15 minutes. They could not find our passports! It took 35 minutes to find it so we were late getting off the ship to meet our tour guide. When they finally found them they blamed the immigration people saying they didn't return them to the right place.

We got off the ship and don't see a guide holding a sign with our names on it. We waited a while, I shopped a bit at some of the kiosks that were set up next to the ship. We asked if we could walk out of the port (the distance was like crossing a street) and were told we couldn't we had to take a cab.
I called Jaime of Patagoniashorex Excursions and asked when and where we should be meeting the guide. He said he'd call the guide to see where he was. Not long after a cab came in and a guy got out holding a sign with our names. He drove us out of the port and there was our guide. He said he couldn't come in and we couldn't walk out. Ironically, as we were waiting for our guide I got an email from a tour guide in Phuket, Thailand saying "see you tomorrow!". I emailed back that the tour is 2019 and we'll see you in a year. He emailed back "see you next year".

***After the tour of Elqui Valley that we were not pleased with (being grouped with a large group and our van had a guide that didn't tell us anything); one member in our group emailed Jaime of Patagoniashorex Excursions to express her disappointment in the tour. I followed that up with an email of my own and Jaime responded saying he would set up refunds for the other 3 in my group and for us he would give us some extra perks on our overland to make up for the less than optimal tour. So, we were anxious when our guide wasn't right there. Jaime had told us our flights had been upgraded to Executive Class on the Lima to Juliaca flights for our visit to Puno. (and would add in some included meals etc. once we were there.

 from our balcony

 Finally we were off for the first part of our tour. On the drive we saw a bunch of flamingoes along the water. Wish we would have had time to stop for a better look and a photo, but we knew our day would be tight. We drove to Venturia Hotel in Paracas and got on a speedboat to the Ballestas Islands located four kilometers off the coast of Peru, near Port San Martin. They are a group of small, rocky islands that are one of the richest and most diverse wildlife sanctuaries in South America. (much like some areas of the Galapagos) 

where we caught the boat to the island

 on our way!

 we passed our ship in port

On the way we were able to see a huge, mysterious symbol carved into the cliff centuries ago. This symbol is called “The Candelabra” because it resembles a candle-holder and is a 500 foot high image, and no one knows who created it or why. It was a teaser for the other geoglyphs we would see later.
Then we continued on to the islands. The boat stopped to get a panoramic view of them. As we got closer to the islands all the dark areas we were seeing were solid patches of birds. What an amzaing sight! the islands have around 600,000 birds at any given time. The guano was a bit pungent as the rocks are covered in it, but in some of the photos it almost looks like crystals or icicles hanging from the rocks. We saw quite a few sea lions and the highlight was seeing families of endangered Humboldt Penguins. (only new penguin seen on the trip) We saw quite a few Peruvian Boobies and Inca Terns and 3 types of beautiful cormorants. We also saw a few "sea spiders". (crabs of some sort that we will identify later.) The tour lasted a couple of hours and it was really awesome going around and between the rocks and the wildlife was amazing.

 me in the front

 Turkey Vultures

 approaching Islas Ballestas

 Guanay Cormorants - 1000's of them

 Sea Lions

 Guanay Cormorants and Peruvian Boobies

 Peruvian Boobys

 Humboldt Penguins & Guanay Cormorant

 who knew bird poo could look pretty - like icicles

 Peruvian Boobies courting

 sea lion on the rock

 going around to the back of the largest island

 Surf-cinclodes

Surf-cinclodes

 Neotropic Cormorant

 solid mass of Guanay Cormorants

Inca Terns

 Inca Terns

Peruvian Boobies - lots of them

 Peruvian Boobies

 Inca Tern

Red-legged Cormorants

 Red-legged Cormorants

 Belcher's Gulls

"Sea Spider"

 the ride back

 Whimbrel

Croaking Ground-Dove

We then drove to the airport in Pisco for our Aerodiana plane flight to see the Nazca Lines. After the mysterious ruins at Machu Picchu, the Nazca Lines are considered to be the greatest ancient mystery in South America. In the Atacama Desert, near the modern-day town of Nazca, we will observe gigantic figures that were drawn in the sand.

Created between 400 and 650 AD, these figures are in the shape of animals like hummingbirds, dogs, whales, birds, and there are also human figures as well. We know that they were created by the ancient Nazcan civilization, but what remains a mystery is how they were created or why. Some people have speculated that the Nazca Lines were made by aliens arriving on a UFO, but most scientists believe that they were created by humans and probably had a ritual or religious purpose.
We arrrived and got checked in and were told our flight was at 12:08, so we had some time to kill. Greg and I bought t-shirts of the Nazca Lines and while we were shopping at the little kiosk a bunch of people from our ship came in. Those of us that do independent touring tend to tour together or at least run into each other a lot.

Their flight left at noon and ours 8 minutes later. The planes were Cessna Grand Caravans that hold 12 passengers and each person gets a window seat. We saw more than 12 of the geoglyphs and the pilot circles and tilts the plane so each side got to see each of them. At first I was worried I wouldn't make them out as there were lots of random lines on the mountains, but the pilot was good at having the wing pointing right at it and of course they were easy to see as they are huge! The flight lasted about 90 minutes. The Panamerican Highway runs through the area and it helped put in perspective how large those things were with trucks looking like toys on the highway.

On the Nasca Lines Circuit (spelled with either an S or a Z depending on Spanish or English spelling) we saw Whale, Compass, Trapezoids, Astronaut, Monkey, Dog, Hummingbird, Spider, Condor, Heron, Parrot, Hands and Tree. On the way back we saw another Hummingbird and Star. Very interesting to see and mind-boggling to think about how and why they were there. The area of the Lines streches out nearly 170 square miles and the size of each geoglypth is gigantic. (though from the flight they didn't seem huge)

Panamerican Highway

Whale & Dog 

 Panamerican Highway

Trapezoid

Astronaut

dust devils

Monkey

Dog

the condor

Spider

 Condor

 Hummingbird

 Condor

 Hummingbird

the spiral

the Parrot

The Tree

 Back at the airport

By this time we were starving, but the guide said lunch was about 40 minutes away. We stopped at an open "food court" off the highway and grabbed some empanadas and arepas to eat in the car on our drive to Lima. Lunch was supposed to be at our cost, but the guide picked up the tab as Jaime had that meal included. The drive from Pisco to Lima was about a 3 and a half hour drive. We stopped for gas and grabbed a couple of sodas and continued on to the airport. We got there with about a half hour to spare. (cutting it a bit close for our taste)

 from the car on the way to Lima

 Lunch Stop

 almost to Lima

We got checked in and we didn't have time to eat and there wasn't much at the terminal anyway. We had hoped for a snack on the plane, but we didn't even get drinks. The flight attendent passed out headsets and then it was announced that it was too turbulent to have cabin service. (it was not) Ah well.

The flight was less than an hour and a half and we were met promptly by Aldo and a driver of Amaru Tours. www.amarutours.com to take us from Juliaca to Puno which was about an hours drive away. We left Lima at 7:20 and arrived in Juliaca at around 9:00 at night.

We stayed at the Sonesta Posadas Del Inca-Puno hotel and we had a Lake view room. (probably an upgrade from Jaime. www.sonesta.pe  It was late, (after 10:00) but we were starving and we went to see if the restaurant at the hotel was still open. They were open but they said soup or sandwiches only. We both ordered the chicken soup which was divine. They also had some wonderful bread. Hated to eat that late and go promptly to bed, but we were starving.

We had a 6:50 pickup time for tomorrow morning, so we unpacked and went right to bed. The room was very nice, but the beds were rock hard. Lake Titicaca is at high altitude and it's cold there despite the fact that it's their summer. We do fine at the altitudes, but we did drink a lot of the coca tea and sucked on a lot of the coca candies to ward off the headaches and other effects of altitude sickness.

Nazca Lines Pisco, Chile  https://photos.app.goo.gl/qyIuPeymtKodGTAr1

Ballestas Islands, Pisco, Chile https://photos.app.goo.gl/oP8ciPz0rrjyfxtG2