Hello from Huacachina from a mosquito bitten, sandboard-bruised pair! We're in Huacachina, Peru, 4 hours South of Lima. It's basically a lagoon in the middle of the desert and the sand dunes rise up all around it. It´s an amazing place with a population of 200. You´ll see from the photos that we tried sandboarding yesterday with a lovely couple that we met at the hostel called James and Nicky. They had heard about a place that took smaller groups of people up to the dunes so there ended up just being the four of us in a bit of a rickety sand buggy - but oh my gosh, those things can go fast!! I was so glad I took some travel sickness pills before I went. At times it felt like you were literally dropping over a clifftop edge of a sand dune and the g-force would just knock us all around. We tried sandboarding off of 3 sand dunes which got increasingly bigger (and for me scarier!). You'll see from the photos that I wasn't much of a natural - I basically clung on for dear life and couldn't get my balance. But Wills was amazing - he managed to stand up for a couple of them. We then moved onto the bigger dunes where you go down face first (yes face first!!) flat on your stomach. At this point I have to admit that I chickened out!!! I was never very good at the death slide when I was little...or abseiling...or anything very adventurous so I then became offical photographer. Wills and the other couple did amazingly. Wills did come off of one of them at the end because it got bumpier right at the bottom and he landed face first in the sand. I of course found this hilarious but Wills was less impressed with sand in his eyes...hehe. I was so proud of him though. Then we watched the sun set over the dunes. It's so amazing to be in a landscape like that - all you can see for miles are the sand dunes and it's literally silent.

So after we washed all the sand away at the hostel we went for a meal with the couple and another girl from our dorm at a place right on the lagoon. The way the town has been built means that all the buildings are right on the lagoon. It was 15soles for 2 courses (around 3 pounds fifty) and we had garlic fish and chicken saltado. We had a few drinks at the hostel and they told us all about their travels as they've been travelling for around 10 months. We had a really good time, it was just good to meet nice people and it's helped us adjust a bit more to this whole travelling way of life! They all said that the first week or so is the hardest and I think that's true, we're still kind of feeling our way - but really loving it too. This morning we had pancakes, well actually it was one massive pancake, and tonight we plan to move onto Cusco (an 18hour overnight coach journey coming up - nice). The coaches are great though - it almost feels like you're on a plane, you get meals, films play the whole time and I've just loved looking out of the window and seeing some more of the country. When we were driving along to Huacachina from Peru I noticed that there are lots of memorials/ religious shrines at the sides of the roads and on a lot of the stone painted walls there are proverbs and other messages painted onto them. The advertising here is amazing too - not just regular rectangular billboards but all sorts of shapes, size, lights etc to advertise stuff like Inca Cola. These are the kinds of things that you just kind of get used to and then forget about...

So as for the mozzy bites - the hostel has been full of them and we´ve both been bitten loads - even Wills who never gets bitten! My legs struggle to look attractive on the best of days but now I have massive raised bites all over them, wonderful. I need to find some anti-histamines somewhere, as soon as I find the words for them in Spanish!

Our next stop is Cusco and Machu Pichu over the next few days - very exciting. It's difficult to upload photos as internet is so slow but we´re trying to just put a few photos up at each stop... Thank you so much for all the messages - they made us smile. Sending love from the desert xx