Huacachina - An Oasis in the Middle of the Peruvian Desert

Yesterday after returning from my 2 day tour of Colca Canyon a few hours outside of Arequipa, I had dinner with a friend of a friend, Santiago, at the Chinese restaurant recommended by Eduardo. Good food and great conversation! Santiago works in marketing for an international textile company - something I´m interested in for the next stage of my career. Again - more evidence that things happen for a reason (example here: I met a friend in NYC (Jennifer) who introduced me to her friend Taiane, who introduced me to her friend Santiago in Arequipa, who works in the industry that I´m interested in!).

After dinner, I took an overnight bus (11 hours) to Huacachina - a very small town on an oasis/lagoon surrounded by high sanddunes in the desert. Huacachina is pictured on the back of Peru´s 50 nuevo sol bill.



The bus seat reclined and looked like a first class seat on an airplane.



The place I had reservations to stay at was a total dump. The room smelled like mildew, I didn´t want to step into the bathroom, and I was unsure about the sheets and bed. So I promptly left and went to the nicest, most expensive hotel in Huacachina. I am paying more than I`d like ($55), but after the last few days I really want a decent place to relax. There is a TV in my room and a very nice terrace restaurant overlooking the lagoon.





There are also turtles walking around the courtyard of my hotel.



I used the hotel computer to complete the rest of my arrangements for the last two weeks of my trip (hotel reservations and my flight to Iquitos). Then I had lunch by the lagoon.



And booked an afternoon dunebuggie ride and sandboarding! I had a couple hours to kill before the dunebuggy ride, so I went to the hotel pool.



Then went on the dunebuggy ride!



The desert is beautiful! I´ve never seen anything like it before.









And I did some sandboarding, which I thought was harder than snowboarding - different textures and took some getting used to. I have video of me sliding on the board on my stomach, but I´m unable to post it now (I also have video of the dunebuggie ride - which was wild and lots of fun).



Here´s a picture of another person going down a sanddune on his stomach.



After that I went back to my hotel and took a long, hot shower (ahhhhh). Seriously - there was sand everywhere, even in my zipped up pockets. And I did some laundry in my bathroom sink too.

After I was refreshed, I had dinner on the terrace restaurent of my hotel overlooking the lagoon.

What a good (and long) day!

Up next: Ica´s vineyards.