Buses and RoundaboutsWe took yet another overnight bus journey to the `White City´ of Arequipa. For some reason the town planners of Nasca decided to put the bus station on the side of a (half-built) roundabout with no cover, which made for a rather cold wait for our bus at midnight (which was only an hour late to be fair). We went for the economy version so were rather cramped for the 9 or so hours it took (they said 7 - not far off!) as well as having to ...

Nasca - My Friend`s HouseWe arrived in Nasca after a short bus ride from Ica (2 hours) and instead of being hounded by the usual pushy men trying to get us to stay in their (usually crap) hotels we were met by a lovely lady who worked for a great little hostel called My Friend`s House! After hearing about all of the tours we could take to view the Nasca Lines (by plane or viewing tower) we decided that they were way too expensive for us. We did however see some o...

The desert oasis We arrived in Ica after an hour long bus journey from Pisco and decided to head to Haucachina in the desert, after being told about a nice lil hostal there. Sand dunes surround the little touristy village with lots of restaurants and hostals sitting next to the oasis. We wanted to book a tour into the desert for some dune buggying and sandboarding and bargained down to a price of 40 soles each (6.50 or so). After some lou...

El Sabor del Peru!Inka Cola - The flavour of Peru...If toxic yellow drinks do it for you then we agree. Arrived in Paracas near Pisco on the coast of Peru yesterday. It`s a tiny village about 25mins away from Pisco, 17 hours on the bus from Cusco. We drove down the Andes with numerous explosive ear popping moments on a super sweet bus, got dinner and then breakfast and the seats were nearly as good as beds, depisite my mp3 player dying after 10 hours and Sarah&ac...

Inca Trail Day 1We had a fairly early start to the first day as we were collected at 6AM to meet our group and guides and travel to KM82, the start of the Inca Trail. We were both pretty excited but slightly daunted by what lay ahead. We had heard from other travellers just how difficult it is and the day didn`t get off to the best of starts when I (S) had my first dodgy stomach of the trip. Our group was made up of people touring Peru as well as two ot...