If feels so good to be home! I missed everyone and the "American classics." Food mostly. I'll update you later on the things I really missed and the things I learned. First, let me continue on from where I left off.
In Huacachina, we broke our promise of never using motorized vehicles, but since we're home, you know it turned out okay. :) We took a tour of the large sand dunes in these large go-carts and went sandboarding once at the top. Our driver was crazy and got the cart stuck a couple of times. We always seem to choose the worst drivers. He was able to dig his way out with a sandboard.
Here we are sandboarding. The first picture is not an accurate depiction because you actually ride on the boards face first. It was the scariest thing I have done on the trip. I can't imagine how bad it would have hurt to fall off. Thank goodness that was not the case. Charlie tried to sandboard the "real" way, but it only ended in him falling on his butt. He didn't attempt again for fear of hurting his back.
The little black spec is me going down the dune head first. Notice how large the hill is. Plenty of time to build up too much speed.
Charlie's turn:
Here is a view of Huacachina. It's a tiny town that surrounds a dirty lake. The locals like to come here to relax, paddle boat, and cool off from the heat. The only locals that actually live in the town are the ones that own and run their family restaurant or hostel.
We met some people from Canada that quickly became our friends. It was nice to bond over our travel experiences with people who spoke English and had been through some of the same things we had. Once the restaurant closed, we weren't ready for bed, so we explored the area. The boys started the tree climbing excursion. I never went very high. Shocker. With my coordination, I would have fallen for sure especially climbing in the dark. Charlie scurried to the top just like a monkey.
Last night out in Huacachina, which wasn't our smartest decision since we had vineyard tours booked the following morning. The bars stay open until 6:00am in South America, and even though we did not stay out that late..it was late enough. We just had so much fun talking to our new friends. Reminded us of being home. 11:00 am came very early the next morning.
We went on three vineyard tours. First one was an older wine vineyard. The cement bottles are what is used to ferment the wine and pisco. Pisco is a clear liquid that is very potent. We got to sample wine and pisco at every vineyard. I started passing up the pisco. It was too strong, and the wine wasn't even very good either. Too sweet.
This machine is used to squish the grapes to get the juice. In the older vineyard, the people would stand on the grapes and squish them with their feet. I was surprised to learn that the grapes used in making wine are completely different from grapes you buy in the store. There are over 25 different kinds of grapes used to make the wines in the vineyards we visited.
Here we are relaxing poolside at our hostel. Charlie had everyone's attention when doing backflips. The locals though he was soooo cool.
Bye bye Huacachina.
I have more updates, so keep reading in your free time!
Love always,
Matti Jo
