If you plan on visiting Peru, you should definitely take the time to visit the mysterious Nazca Lines. Located in the Nazca Desert in southern Peru, these giant 2000-year-old drawings stretch for hundreds of miles.
There are about 70 drawings of plants and animals, some of which are 1200-feet-long, as well as over 300 different geometric drawings, some of which comprise of 30-mile-long lines. There are also lots of different etchings, such as a 98-feet-long mythical creature and the famous “Astronaut” figure.
What Exactly Are the Nazca Lines?
The Nazca Lines are a group of giant geoglyphs that are etched into the ground. No one knows for sure who created them, but anthropologists do have a few theories.
One is that the Nazca culture created them sometime between 100 BC and 700 AD. The other is that the Paracas culture, and the Chavín culture, which is the oldest pre-Inca culture in Peru, created some of the geoglyphs way before the Nazca.
Whoever it was, they certainly needed a lot of time to create the huge Nazca Lines. But how did they do it?
The Nazca Desert has a floor that’s covered in pebbles coated with iron oxide. When etching the lines and drawings, the ancient cultures had to remove about 15 inches of rock for the drawings to be actually visible, as removing those inches revealed the sand below.
Take a One-Day Nazca Lines Tour from Lima
If you’re interested in taking a day tour to the mysterious Nazca Lines, South America Tours is here for you. We offer a wonderful Nazca Lines tour from Lima that includes a flight over the Nazca Lines and a lunch in the enchanting city of Paracas.
You’ll start at 6 AM when we’ll pick you up at your hotel in Lima and take you to a bus to Paracas. In the morning hours, you’ll embark on a tourist bus from Lima to Paracas. Around 10:45 AM we’ll head over to Pisco Regional Airport to check you into a 12:00 PM flight that will take you to see the Nazca Lines.
During the flight, you’ll be able to fully appreciate the peculiar etchings, which is really only possible from the sky.
After the exciting flight, we’ll take you to one of the best restaurants in Paracas to savor the delicious local cuisine, before we take you back to Lima by bus. Your Nazca Lines day tour will end at 8:30 PM when we transfer you back to your hotel.
If you decide to take the Nazca Lines tour from Lima, don’t hesitate to contact us for booking information. Also, we have a lot of other tours you can take across South America, so be sure to check them out!