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Sep. 26, 2016. Hospedaje Yemaya, Nazca, Peru.
Checked into this wonderful hospedaje near the center of town after a night bus ride from Cuzco (about 10 hours), then signed up for a tour, along with about a dozen other tourists. The overflight ($80) was a bit of a disappointment - the Nazca Lines were hard to see from the air, and I suspect my photos won't be much better - but still impressive for their size and extent.
Took an afternoon tour of the surrounding area, in a large dune buggy. Cahuachi was the high spot, the most important Nazca center, with several pyramids; the Ocongalla Aqueducts, which are still in working order and serve to irrigate the surrounding fields; the Chauchilla Cemetery, with ancient bones, skulls and mummy fragments scattered about the dunes; and finally, a little sandboarding on a small dune.
Decided early in the evening to conquer Cerro Blanco, the highest sand dune in the world, the next morning. Overheard on the phone call the guide asking the hotel manager how old I was (he guessed around 50), and whether he thought I could make it. Gulp.
The Nazca lines were created between 500 BC and 500 AD by people making depressions or shallow incisions in the desert floor, removing pebbles and leaving different-colored dirt exposed. Hundreds are simple lines and geometric shapes; more than 70 are zoomorphic designs, including a hummingbird, arachnid, fish, condor, heron, monkey, lizard, dog, cat, and a human. Other shapes include trees and flowers. Erich von Däniken. suggested that "ancient astronauts" had constructed these works. The number of known Nazca geoglyphs amounted to 358 in 2022. Drones now are being used to assist the anthropologists researching the area and are expected to enable them to discover many more.
I took the top two pictures only. The bottom picture, of a hummingbird, I found on the Internet.
Ocongalla Aqueducts. The aqueducts ensured the water supply for the surrounding fields, allowing the cultivation of cotton, beans, potatoes, corn, cotton, vegetables and fruit trees. They were built with flagstones and huarango trunks.
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