Pisac and off to Ica
The next day we got up early because there was quite a bit we wanted to fit in before getting back to Cusco to catch a bus at 4pm to Ica, which would be a 16hr overnight bus ride away.
We had breakfast at the hostel and then headed back to the area where we would catch another colectivo to Pisac. It was about an hour and a half ride there, but it was an entertaining ride seeing how many people we could squish into the vehicle. Once we arrived in Pisac we checked out the market, as Sunday was a big market day. It ended up being huge and we bought some fresh veggies to make a sandwich with before going to check out the ruins above the town. They were not within walking distance so we took a taxi up the mountain, but found out when we got there that it was only one way and we would need to find another one on the way back. The ruins were huge and my knee was hurting a bit so we didn’t do too much wandering around. When it was time to go down we didn’t want to pay for an expensive taxi again because there were tons of tourist buses that were going the same direction. We ended up hopping on tourist bus with the help of one of the guides who found one with space…we think he misunderstood us and thought our bus left without us so he felt bad for us…but we weren’t going to ask any questions since we got a free ride out of it :). once we got back into town we had to catch the bus back to Cusco in time to get our next bus to Ica. We got our bags and made it just in time.
The overnight bus ended up being much worse than I expected. The bus itself was nice but we were doing hairpin turns on a big bus through the mountains for honestly 12 hours straight. The only way to not get car sick was to sleep, I couldn’t even watch a show on my tablet. We arrived safe and sound in Ica at 8 the next morning and caught a cab straight to Huacachina (Google it!). It is like an Oasis in the desert with a bunch of hotels and hostels built around a laguna that is in the middle of a bunch of huge sand dunes.