After our epic journey from Mancora, we checked into our hostel in Pisco at 10pm and booked our tour for the next morning to Ballestas Islands in the Paracas National Reservation. Even though the last thing we felt like doing was getting up at 6.30am...we figured we should seize the chance, so we could move on if we wanted to.

Pisco is a recovering city, as 80% of the city was destroyed in 2007 earthquake. As you can see from the pictures the city is only starting to redevelop. It's still a bit like a building site! And it was very dry and airid.

So we were up bright and early and set off for Paracas to go to see the 'poor man's Galapagos'.

We joined a heap of other tourists in a boat and set off towards the islands. About 10mins out we passed another attraction in the area, known as "El Candelabro", a giant lamp dug in the rough sand in the method used by the creators of the Nazca Lines. The origins of "El Candelabro" are not known and theories vary, from it having religious significance, to it being created by aliens!!! What is helping to preserve the sculpture is the fact that it rarely rains, and when we say rarely we mean never!!! On average they get 0.07mm of rain...a year!!! ..just like home we hear you say!!!!

Once we had our pictures taken of this is was out to the Ballestas Islands, an area which is populated by about half a million birds!!! As well as sea lions, crabs, mussels and more birds!!!With 2 security guards there to preserve the integrity of the area!

The main income after tourism in the area is from guano (bird sh1t, more specifically one eyed gannet sh1t!!!) They collect the guano once every 5-7 years (what a job that is), it takes 2-3 months to collect it, they get on average 4000 tonnes, and they make $400 per tonne.

We saw loads of birds, including pelicans, penguins, cormorants, Peruvian boobies, the one eyed gannets and Inca terns. We were lucky not to take a direct hit, as this is a common occurrence when you are travelling below so many birds. In the pictures, any areas of black on the landscape are thousands of birds...they are covering the ground so thickly they made it look dark!!!Mad!!!

After the trip we were back to the pier, where we were lucky enough to sample a local speciality of pecans covered in caramel and chocolate....they were tasty!!!...

From there it was back to the hostel, where we decided not to spend another night, but to head an hour or so down the road, to Huacachina.