Islas Ballestas and Huacachina

SEA LIONS!

PENGUINOS!

PELICANS!

Today, we took the day to accomplish some touristy ends (as moneylenders don't usually collect on sundays anyways). We woke up early and went to Pisco/Paracas to see las Islas Ballestas. They're known as 'the poor man's Galapagos Islands'. We could only see the from the boat we were on, but it was still cool to see penguins, LOTS of different kinds of birds, and sea lions basking on these big rock-like islands off the coast. We had a good time, and as you can see, I had befriended some pelicans by the end of the trip!

Once we got back to our hotel in Ica, we decided we should check out the nearby city of Huacachina during our downtime before the world cup final. Turns out it was a pretty cool place. There are huge sand dunes there (we still don't really understand why) and a pretty artificial lake plopped in the middle of the tiny town. We enjoyed watching some people attempt to sandboard down the slopes, then hiked down watched Espana's victory over Holland at a restaurant in town. Overall a very enjoyable day.

We had plans to leave Ica tomorrow and head to Nasca. However, our research director has decided that we should stay in Ica for a few more days and try to take down some borrower interviews. We're a little bummed, because there really isn't much to do in Ica. But, we're going to work hard the next few days so we can get enough data to leave soon without feeling too bad!