Day 5—Monday, July 4th—Ica/Huacachina

training for next season
Originally uploaded by rswells.

As I wrote in a brief post that day, Tali and I ended up somewhat stranded in Huacachina for the whole day and night because farmers and peasants had blocked the highway passage back to Lima. Their beef was squarely with a/the free trade agreement with the United States. Our captivity turned out to be a pleasant and pensive one, though, for we spent most of the afternoon and evening up on a dune overlooking the town and the surrounding desert. We also ended up with a better room at the hostel. Plus, Huacachina breaks down more or less like this: bikins by the pool during the day, north faces by the bar at night.

Later on we attended a barbecue at one of the other local hostals, but we didn’t eat anything from the official bbq tent—we just drank, Cuba Libres for Tali and cerveza for Beto. Tali did eventually get a little hungry, so we went inside the place to the restaurant for a chicken sandwich. At this point, all hell broke loose downstairs as a nasty fight broke out between many of the local workers in the hostel’s lobby. Most of them had been drinking since noon in celebration of the boss’ birthday. Things got ugly fast. I couldn’t see what was going on too well from my high vantage point, nor did I dare take any photos, but I could’ve sworn I saw one poor, drunken soul get an uppercut—POW! Right in the kisser! When we cautiously came back downstairs, things were still heated and strong words bellowed from a few men; the tourists, meanwhile, were all nothing’s going on around the bar. I somewhat achieved my goal to talk to new people that night, striking up a conversation with a Peruvian young man from Pisco who loves Usher and DMX and asked me question after question about the US and a rugged Norwegian whose eyes were so lazy I thought he was blind—I didn’t talk to the latter for too long, however, because he threw off my balance. And though my eyes struggled mightily to discern whether or not a pair of Australian birds were indeed attractive or not, I spoke not a word to them.


For the second 4th of July in a row, I saw no fireworks; last summer I saw hail in Oaxaca, México.