Who said it would be a good idea to come to Huacachina on a weekend? Apparently all of the surrounding area descends on the place for the weekend and from our hotel all we could hear all night was cars going up and down the 50 meter strip, which is the only road here, boom boxes playing all night, the disco next door and people banging on the door of the hotel to be let in late at night (or early in the morning). Not such a great night.

Oh well. The hotel Huacachinero was still very nice. Their breakfast was great - wonderful coffee, fresh papaya or pineapple juice, eggs, rolls and the avocado we had brought with us. This was topped off with a nice conversation with Tal on Skype. They also have a beautiful pool that we sat by in the morning. While I read my book Omer went to rent a snowboard to try his luck on the dunes behind the hotel. The theory is the same but the sand isn't quite as fast as the snow and it didn't seem like he really got going before he was at the bottom already. Add to that the grueling climb back up the dune in the heat of the day and it didn't seem like such a success to me. I think he had fun though.

We spent the rest of the day wandering around this very small place. There's basically one route around the lagoon which takes about ten minutes. We got dragged into a restaurant on the promenade and were treated to our first Pisco Sours which is the local drink here. It's made from Pisco, which is a type of brandy made in the surrounding area, lime juice and beaten egg whites. Delicious! A bit like a margarita. We decided to book a tour to the nearby bodegas to see how Pisco was made and have some more to drink!

Saturday night turned out to be no quieter than Friday night so we moved hotels to a quieter area on Sunday. The new hotel (Curasi) is also nice but not quite as nice as Huacachinero. It was definitely quieter though. After moving we took our tour to the nearby bodegas, sampling different types of Pisco. We tried sweet wine, pure Pisco, Pisco with cream (a little like Baileys), Pisco with orange, Pisco with figs..... You get the idea. We had a lot of Pisco. We also had a tour of their distillery and vineyards which are very old and traditional. Everything is done in the old fashioned way and not with modern equipment. I especially liked the grape press made from a huge tree stump and a circle of wood that weighed about one ton. Even the screw to release the weight was made of wood. We bought a bottle of the Pisco Sour to have by the pool and went back to Huacachina. We spent the afternoon sleeping off all the Pisco by the pool. Another sleepy day in Huacachina. After all the resting we climbed up to the top of one of the dunes to watch the sunset. It was beautiful.