“Paracas is a mini Galapagos island and the Nazca Lines are awesome!”
The Nazca Lines are an unexplained phenomenon. They were only discovered in 1939 during an irrigation study of the area and aerial photos were taken. Cut into the stony desert are large numbers of lines, not only parallels and geometrical figures, but also designs such as a dog, an enormous monkey, birds, a spider and a tree. The only way to view this phenomenon is to take a flight over endless desert to then see these amazing, unexplained pictures in the sand.
The Peninsula de Paracas and the nearby Islas Ballestas make up La Reserva Nacional de Paracas, the most important wildlife sanctuary on the Peruvian coast. This is an excellent area for seeing bird and marine life. Ballestas Islands are Peru’s mini equivalent of the Galapagos Islands and you will definitely see lots of sea lion colonies, cormorants, Peruvian boobies, pelicans and if you are lucky penguins and flamingos. There are so many birds nesting on these islands that their nitrogen-rich droppings (guano) is collected for commercial use as a fertiliser. As you leave the peninsular you will see on the left-hand side the Candelabra, which is a large figure etched into the coastal hillside, similar to the Nasca Lines figures.
