Apr. 13-14 - Where snowboards go to die

The next stop on my journey was Huacachina, a tiny oasis just outside of Ica, the largest town near Pisco. Huacachina is a hang out spot for travelers along the Peruvian coast where there are all night parties and fantastic sandboarding in the surrounding sand dunes. That wasn’t my experience with the town.

When I arrived in Ica, I was approached by a very friendly man who wanted to save me some time and money and suggested I stay in Ica, at his brother’s hotel. He told me that he owned a hotel in Huacachina and that it was one of the only two that were left standing after the earthquake, only had water for two hours a day and there was no electricity. Had I not been working in Pisco I would have believed him, but I knew there was no way his story was true, hotels had been built very quickly and electricity had been restored within three weeks of the earthquake. When I finally did arrive in Huacachina, as I suspected, there was only one hotel that hadn’t reopened and all others were fine. You would never have known there was an earthquake seven months ago if it weren’t for the one hotel that didn’t reopened.

That night, the party that I had been told about didn’t happen. It turns out that Huacachina is quite dead on a Monday night, not that it should suprise me. In spite of not being surrounded by lots of people to hang out with, I did manage to find three other guys to spend the evening chatting with; two from Argentina, and one from Australia. It made for an interesting evening as I became the translator for everyone as the Argentineans didn't speak much English and the Australian didn't speak Spanish. Even the bartender got into it and had me teach him a few things in English so he could better help the hotel guests in the future.

The next day I got up early in hopes of going sandboarding. After breakfast, I rented a board from the hotel and headed out to try sandboarding. Well, let's just say, this is something that Lonely Planet hyped up more than was needed. I started on a small hill in hopes of practicing a bit. The heat was extreme and you kept sliding back down while climbing the sand dunes. It took about 10 minutes to get to the top, and once there I put on the board, I stood up and didn't move. I had to bend over to push myself along in order to get any speed. Covered in sand, I decided to climb up the highest sand dune in hopes of getting enough speed that I could probably try to turn. After 20 minutes of climbing, I reached the top, put on the board, pointed it directly downhill and didn't move. I pushed myself a bit, and didn't move. All I could do was push myself along and move slowly down the hill. In the end I just took off the board and ran down the hill ... which was more fun and a lot faster. I guess after skiing on real snow, sand just isn't fast enough .... and there's something wrong when you're skiing and suffering from heat stroke .... it just doesn't seem right.

As soon as I got to the bottom of my third run, I took a shower to get rid of the sand (it went everywhere .... I mean everywhere), got a cab back to Ica and hopped on a bus to Lima. My sandboarding and partying adventure in Huacachina was a bust!