After the surprisingly safe and cheap bus journey with Perubus! down the Panamerican Highway to Ica, we got a taxi out of town to a small natural Oasis in the desert called "Huacachina". Whilst supposedly having curative properties and high mineral content, the lagoon gives an intersting odour to the entire small settlement, which consists of a handful of hostels, tour agencies, bars and restaurants around the lagoon.
The inevitable case of "the runs" hit Andy on the first evening, and I woke up to find him with a fever of thirty nine and a half degrees and intermittent shivering, shooting tummy pains, and in need of a toilet every 10 minutes. Needless to say he got very little sleep. However, I forced him to get out of bed, take a handfull of pills and vitamins and some rehydration salts, and he was feeling well again within a couple of hours (the need for the toilet, however, has not diminished!)
After Dr. Sophie´s "gentle" guidance, I decided to get out of bed and partake in a dune ascent. Within moments I was light-headed and needed a rest. Sophie managed to amaze once more by crafting two "sand chairs" with her flip flops, and after a few moments of forced rehyrdation I was feeling much better. Soph´s tough love approach appeared to be working! My tummy at least temporarily soothed, we decided to take a pedalo out onto the lagoon. After the relaxing ride, we decided to sort out my digestive difficulties with a shot of adrenaline. So we to to the dunes for a buggy ride and sandboarding excursion.
After strapping in to the sand-mobile, we headed into the desert at what seemed like hurtling speeds up and very much down mountains of sand!....after which we quickly broke down and needed to jump ship into sand buggy 2: the replacement. We began sandboarding down baby dunes to get the hang of it. Sophie, the dark horse, showed yet MORE skill by showing up every other person in our buggy group! Her braking skills, however, need much improvement and her bum is most definitely not a brake pad. Meanwhile, I embraced my feminine side, deciding to give myself a free exfoliating facial treatment by sitting on the board and hurtling down one of the biggest dunes and using my feet as stoppers, whilst spraying my face with buckets of sand! However, the trip was one of our highlights so far and we are still removing sand from our ears!
Today we got another bus with Perubus! from Ica down to Nazca and have found a lovely small place to stay tonight. Must dash - Sophie´s forced me to drink so much water to rehydrate myself I´m now bursting for the loo for better reaons than before! Will update soon!
Andy and Sophie xx
