Lima and the start of the Gringo Trail - 28th March to 2nd April

Flew in from New York on an overnight red eye and got in to Lima airport at 6.30am which was only an hour behind NYC time. Checked into our hostel in the San Isidro part of the city and then headed out and about.

Headed to the Miraflores region on our first morning and afternoon to check out ´Love Park´ which had decent coastal views and a graphic statue (nice). Managed to get an awesome 3 course lunch for about 3 quid each which was a good intro to Peruvian cuisine. Hadn´t realised quite how world famous Peruvian food has become recently and can vouch for the fact that it´s very tasty! Guinea pig (cuy), Llama and Alpaca will definitely be sampled at some point.

We´d randomly been given a full dorm room to ourselves which was great - although not when people play table tennis literally right outside your single pain window - arrrrggghhhh. Also back to no loo paper down the loo - double arrrgghhhh!

Headed to the UNESCO central district the next day to check out Plaza Mayor and Plaza San Martin which were both great in the sunshine. 27oC was definitely a vast improvement on Manhattan and good to see fellow backpackers knocking around again.

Also took in the San Francisco cathedral monastery for a guided tour which was surprisingly interesting. Went down to the creepy catacombs underneath which supposedly houses 25,000 or so Limans. Very creepy and dusty and couldn´t help feeling we were breathing in a few remnants of past generations - uurggh.

Tried to check out the ´Magico´ fountains in the evening which are supposed to be great, but realised once we got a cab there that they´re only open later in the week. Gutted, but noticed a few other pissed off looking tourists so at least we weren´t the only ones.

Comforted ourselves with our first Pisco sour (traditional drink with lime juice, whipped sugar and pisco brandy), but didn´t like it to be honest, like drinking bleach!

Headed south on the amazing Cruz del Sur bus next day to Paracas and it was like being on a flight, minus the near heart attack of take-off and landing. Films, great food and not a psycho/dead-leg in sight. Checking in bags and booking tickets in advance was also seamless - SCREW YOU GREYHOUND.

Should have only stayed one night here as there is literally nothing to do, but the Islas Ballestas boat tour.

The tour itself was really cool and we jumped on a speed boat with a load of other gringos and headed out to the islands for a 2.5 hour morning of sightseeing.

Saw thousands of boobys (a sight for sore eyes), red headed vultures, penguins and sea lions and also the ´Candalabra´ which is a sand etching from hundreds if not thousands of years ago. Thought to have been put in the specific place it´s in as there´s never any rain or wind so no erosion and could be a tribute to water or message to the gods from the ancient peoples.

The islands themselves really stank because of all of the brid crap which was up to 50 metres deep in places and has been exported for years as good fertiliser. The fervour, noise and clamouring for a photo on site of a single penguin was RIDICULOUS from some of our annoying boat companions. Disappointingly though, none of them were shat on or fell in.

Sarah got stuck into our first portion of cerviche in the evening (raw fish with lime juice) which was actually really tasty.

Headed south again to Nasca the next day which was slightly bigger than Paracas, but you could still easily do it in a single night although we stayed for 2.

We went to see a kind of mini lecture about the Nasca lines on our first evening at the Nasca Lines hotel mini planetarium which was really interesting. Loads of theories on the lines, but they are probably most likely to have been related to the worship / use of water, religious sites that were walked on, astrological markings to mark the calendar or alien landing sites in that order. It´s argued that it could be several of these and their use changed over time which is also possible.

We also saw the hotel room of Maria Reiche, a german scientist who devoted 40 years of her life to the study and preservation of the lines. Unbelievably devoted and clever lady although could have been half a brick short of a full load in our opinion.

We caught a collectivo (bus with loads of locals on which was comedy) out to the Mirador viewpoint next morning to check out some of the lines ourselves. Having done a bit of research into flights over the lines we´d decided not to take one because you pay a fortune for a roughly 20 minute flight and a lot of people are ill because of the steep turns the pilots make. It wasn´t because of the dubious plane safety records or recent crashes making me bottle it all - oh no.

Anyway, we saw the ´tree´ and ´frog´ lines which were actually a lot smaller than we´d expected, but none the less impressive and definitely worth the trip.

Nasca centre was pretty boisterous as there´s a lot of electioneering on at the moment as the national election is this coming Sunday. Quite comedy to see all the cars with speakers driving around pouring out propaganda and there were even a few party bands playing shows and trying to get people to sign up. No candidate seems to agree with Nick over here though.

Next stop - Arequipa.