To Ica – 5/1/2013
May 2nd, 2013 by rallyadmin
We get a beautiful day after a no so beautiful night. First, there are the explosions which are probably from fireworks prematurely celebrating May Day. I hope they’re from fireworks because we sitting in a bowl made by three volcanoes, one of which has a nasty habit of destroying Arequipa every hundred years or so.
Then there are the car alarms. Apparently, the local car thieves work generally from 1:00 AM to 3:00 AM if the timing of the alarms means anything. This is followed by the hotel staff banging on doors at 5:00 AM giving wakes up to guests who are flying out on the 7:00 AM plane. Some guests need a lot more door banging than others.
And lastly, the chickens. At this altitude, plus 8,000 feet, the dawn comes early. And with the dawn comes the rooster crowing. My advice if you visit Arequipa, go to bed early.
But there’s not much traffic in town in the morning, certainly not like the mad house the night before. We get fuel and start out for Ica. It’s going to be another long day.
And the road is going to be another long desert slog with the ocean to the west and the Andes in the far distance to the east. It’s more of what we’ve been driving for days now. Nothing but barren sand, gravel and rocks. And as in Chile, not very much traffic.
We drive this until early afternoon, the road turns west toward the coast and then back to the northwest. The coast is one very long beach strand with only a very occasional cove or point. The road runs along the narrow plain between the beach and the seaside cliff. Where the cliff drops directly into the ocean, the road climbs up to a slim ribbon of tarmac carved out of the hillside. It’s a beautiful ride with miles and miles of breaking surf. And absolutely noone around.
As we move farther north, there are canyons that carry rivers that only flow during the rainy season. But the canyons run east to west and the road is north south. That means that at every canyon, the road has to drop down to sea level cross the canyon and then climb the other side. It breaks the monotony but at every climb the 18 wheelers slow the traffic to a crawl and the slowly climb back out of the valley.
As we follow the coast road the wind off the ocean picks up nd soon sand is drifting across the road. But for the brown color, it looks identical to snow drifting across an Arctic road in the Northwest Territories during the Alcan. Spindrifts are forming on the sides of the road and a few times we see equipment moving the growing sand dunes off the road. If it weren’t for the sound of the car being sand blasted in the wind, you’d think it was the far north in the winter.
It’s a long boring day. Desert and more desert. But the wind finally dies down. The break of the day comes in Nasca, the site of the famous Lines of Nasca, a huge area of over 500 sq. kilometers. There are literally hundreds of geoglyphs drawn on the table top flat plain. The glyphs has inspired all kinds of theories about their origin, many suggestions extra-terrestial help in the building of the glyphs.
A long the Panamericana, there is a tower that we climb to get an elevated look at the glyphs. They are remarkable and beautiful but it seems wishful thinking to propose that they were created by aliens, though standing in this barren desert could lead you to many less than rational theories.
We move on to Ica where we are planning on staying for the night. Our plan to stop driving by nightfall hasn’t worked out too well. We keep arriving in these cities after dark in the middle of evening traffic. We thought Arica was bad, it has nothing on Ica.
The traffic is just horrendous on the long entry into the city. We’re headed for an upscale resort that John stayed at 20 years ago. We weave through the traffic made totally insane by the antics of the moto-taxis who seem to either have a lot on misplaced faith in the rest of the drivers on the road or are seriously overestimating their talent. This is really getting ugly.
But we find the resort. They have a room (a very, very nice room). They have a restaurant. They have wine.
We clean up. Stop in the bar for a drink. Then dinner. They have alpaca tenderloin on the menu. I can’t resist. First kangaroo in Oz, now alpaca in Peru. It turns out to have a strange but very good taste. The wine doesn’t hurt either.
Finally, to bed. What a day.
Obi-wan