Nazca - Nazca lines

Astronaut
see all photos »

Our time had come had come to an end in Arequipa, and for us this has to be one of the better cities that we had been to in South America.

After our Colca Canyon trip we took a night bus up to Nazca, which would take us 8 hours. The bus was one of the most comfortable ones we have had and hence we arrived fresh and ready to explore the Nazca.

The entire desert area was once home to the ancient Nazca and Paracas cultures which preceded the Incas by over 500 years. Remains of their cultures can still be found.

Humming bird
see all photos »

Cut into the stony desert of about 20km north of Nazca are the famous Nazca lines. The enormous lines have been etched into the ground by scraping away the dark rocks to reveal lighter ones underneath. Large numbers of lines, not only parallels or geometrical figures, but also designs such as a dog, an enormous monkey and a spider can be seen. The lines are best seen from the air, so we took a taxi to the airport and got on a Chessna together with the pilot and 3 others. After having seen an informative video on the history of these lines, we took off at about 8am for 30 min flight.

Condor
see all photos »

This flight is not for the faint-hearted as the pilot shows the figures on either side of the plane, hence quite a bit of movement from left to right.

The lines were studied by Maria Reiche for over 40 years. She maintained that they represent some sort of vast astronomical pre-Inca calendar. Other theories claim that the Incas danced along the lines for ceremonial reasons (having an entry and exit point).

It was very impressive to see some of the figures and their size (the astronaut is 30m in height and the dog 80m in length).

Spider
see all photos »

The rest of the day we spent relaxing on the main sqaure and enjoying one of the many good and cheap restaurants. At 6:30pm we took a night bus to Cusco.