Chauchilla Cemetery and Nasca

Well as if we hadn´t seen enough mummies in Arequipa we stopped off at Chauchilla Cemetery. Here the mummies are preserved by the desert heat in an area where it never rains. There are a number of excavated toombs in this pre-inca cemetery where the mummies are still intact with hair and skin.

We arrived at Nazca and stayed in a hotel - campsite which had a pool. We spent most of the rest of the day chilling by the pool. That night I decided to go to a talk on the mysterious Nazca lines which we were going to visit the following day.

Thes lines were scratched on the surface of the desert ground between 500 B.C. and A.D. 500. They are among archaeology's greatest enigmas because of their quantity, nature, size and continuity. The pictures and lines known as geoglyphs depict living creatures, stylized plants and imaginary beings, as well as geometric figures several kilometres long. They are many theories to explain the lines from astronomic calendars, signposts pointing out water to one theory which suggests that they are alien landing strips.

Anyway some of the girls had arranged to go to a talk on the lines by an associate of the late Maria Reiche, a researcher who had dedicated much of her life to researching the lines, so I decided to tag along. Well I must admit that strange does not begin to describe the evening that followed. We finally arrived at a dark house in the middle of knowhere and were ushered in to a garage where we had to sit on sandbags infront of a giant map. The lady doing the talk had one of the most off putting stares I have ever seen. One of the girls, Rachel, checked the price as the talk was about two dollars more than in the Lonely Planet - after beeing told "What can we do?" the woman refused to answer anymore questions from Rachel for the rest of the night. The talk itself was quite good and had some interesting theories about the lines and all of the figures depicted however it was mixed with some strange claims like the fact that our host was from the cosmos and travelled everywhere on a flying carpet (although I had seen her bike propped up against the wall!). Our host also explained that she needed volunteers to cut back some trees - we all assumed she meant to clear the lines themselves until she took us out into her garden and showed us her own trees - needless to say we did not hang about any longer than necessary.

The next day I had a flight over the lines themselves which was incredible. The planes were small 4 seater aircraft and I was glad that I´d skipped breakfast as we circled around and around the figures. You wear headphones and the pilot points out all the shapes and figures. I´ve included a few here for you to see - the whale and the owl man (or astraunaut or spaceman).




What makes these figures particularly impressive is the fact that they can only be seen from the air and the civilation of the time had no way of flying and there are no hills or mountains nearby.

On our way out of Nazca we stopped at the viewing tour where you can look down on two of the figures (without getting air sick).

We then headed off towards Pisco.