A little over 3 hours south of Lima by
coach, Paracas is for many the first stop on the southern circuit of
internationally famous tourist destinations that includes the Ballestas Islands, Nazca and its mysterious lines,
Arequipa, Lake Titicaca, Cuzco and of course Machu Picchu. It was in Paracas
that we started our epic journey
through southern and central Peru.
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| Ballestas Islands |
The Paracas peninsula, a large area of
coast to the south and the Ballestas Islands together make up the National
Reserve of Paracas in the province of Pisco, with reportedly the highest
concentration of marine birds in the world. Aside from this stupendous natural
beauty and the stunning rock beaches, there is little of interest to the
visitor in the town of Paracas, but the climate is warmer and less cloudy than
Lima, the ocean cleaner, and it makes a good spot to relax for a couple of days
by the hotel pool. It is to Paracas that
for decades affluent Limeño families have come for a weekend fix of sun and
sea.
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| Spot The Astronaut - One of the Nazca Lines |
Where to Stay
The
Hotel Paracas, part of
The Luxury Collection of 80 boutique hotels and resorts scattered around the world, is
situated just a few metres away from the Pacific Ocean, and 300m from the town
square.
Famous since it first opened as the only
luxury hotel on Peru's south coast in 1944, this hotel has always been a
favourite weekend destination for the well heeled residents of Lima. They
remain the majority guests in the new hotel, which was completely rebuilt at a
cost of $50m after the massive 2007 earthquake severely damaged the original
building.
Re-opened in 2009, today the hotel is a 5 star affair with 120
villas, two swimming pools, a spa and a choice of restaurants and bars. It also
has its own private launch for visiting the nearby Ballestas Islands, famous
for their sea lions, dolphins puffins and penguins.
The hotel's rooms are in villas scattered
over the site, some with an ocean view, others facing the gardens. Our room was
spacious, with wooden floorboards throughout and a restful colour scheme of
white linens, distressed white louvered woodwork, and natural bamboo. It was
well equipped with air-conditioning, satellite TV, iPlayer docking system and
minibar. The bathroom had a power shower
and separate bath, and double sink. Outside was a private balcony overlooking
tropical gardens. The hotel’s magnificent grounds were immaculately maintained
with myriad local plants and flowers.
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| Our gorgeous villa at the Paracas Hotel |
Breakfast is served in the main dining room
overlooking the larger of the two pools, a stunning setting. There is a good
range of perfectly ripe and sweet exotic fruit salads and juices, which I
always make a point of enjoying when I am in a tropical country.
The buffet has a generous spread of hams,
cheeses, yoghurt, bread, pastries, and cooked items kept in heated dishes -
bacon, scrambled eggs, sausages and the like.
There is also a menu of made to order
items, from which we tried a delicious French toast (a thick wedge of toast
fried in custard, scattered with cinnamon all smothered in maple syrup and
topped with strawberries which was scrumptious), eggs Benedict over brioche and
ham and cheese panino, all very good. But best of all, the coffee was strong
and well flavoured.
Where to Eat
Chalana Restaurant
It has to be admitted that the restaurants
of Paracas are few and not particularly enticing. Most are cheap and cheerful,
and are in a strip overlooking the jetty from which boats leave towards the
Ballestas Islands. Although I always try to find good restaurants outside the
hotels I stay in and we did eat in the town, the experience was not positive,
so having heard about the million dollar kitchens installed in the
Hotel Paracas in 2009, we decided to stick to the hotel's restaurants.
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| Seaside Restaurants at Paracas - to be avoided |
For lunch, the Chalana Restaurant is the
obvious choice. Situated at the end of the hotel's private pier, and standing
about 100 metres into the Pacific, it is the place for ceviche and tiraditos.
Surprisingly given its precarious location, it is equipped with a state of the
art chef's station, all gleaming stainless steel and spotless refrigeration
cabinets.
The tables are of bare,
white-painted wood befitting the maritime location. Executive Chef Franco
Rivadeneyra explained that all the fish served there comes daily from a local
fisherman who has been supplying the hotel for years.
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| Chalana Restaurant - not a bad place to work! |
The stunning freshness of the fish became
clear with the dishes that followed. We watched the Chef José Luis make a traditional
ceviche from a fillet of raw seabass, chopped and marinated for about 3 minutes
with the tiny but very zingy local limes, along with chilli, garlic, coriander
and seasoning. He then added some 'leche de tigre' - a milky fish stock, and
finished the dish with wafer thin shredded red onion and a red chilli.
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| Chef Jose Luis at Work |
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| Adding Leche de Tigre - Tiger's Milk to the Fish |
Served
with the traditional accompaniments of boiled sweet potato, fresh and toasted
corn, this was a magnificent dish the like of which I have never tasted outside
Peru. It had the perfect combination of chilli heat, fresh acidity and vibrancy
from the freshest fish, herbs and raw onion.
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| Ceviche with a View |
Next was a tiradito - a Peruvian raw fish
dish invented by Japanese chef Toshiro Konishi (whom I got to interview in
Lima, but more of that later). Akin to sashimi, Tiradito differs from ceviche
in the way that the fish is cut (into 4mm slices rather than chunks), and in
the absence of onions. Again this was a dish of raw seabass, sprinkled with
lime juice and seasoning, and served with a side of sweet potato, fresh and
toasted corn. But the finish was very different, this time the fish being
bathed in an aji amarillo (yellow pepper) sauce on one side, a aji rocoto (red
pepper) sauce on the other. The tiradito was also deliciously zingy with the
delicate chilli heat balanced by the sweet potato and corn.
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| Tiradito of Seabass with Ajs Amarillo & Rocoto Cream and Leche de Tigre |
We had a fantastic Causa – a typical
Peruvian dish of mashed potatoes of various colours, topped or stuffed with
meat or seafood, less well known than ceviche, but very good all the same. At
the Chalana’s version, we had a selection of octopus, prawns and fish. Wonderfully colourful and a treat to look at,
it was delicious to eat too.
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| Causa with Seafood |
To finish, we had a simple but wonderful
dish of sliced raw scallop with shavings of parmesan, crushed toasted corn, a
leaf or two of rocket and olive oil. I have not eaten scallop with Parmesan
before but it was a great combination, and the addition of the crushed corn was
brilliantly effective, adding both a crunchy texture and a delicate savour to
the dish.
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| Raw Sliced Scallops and Shavings of Parmesan |
This was simple but really accomplished
cooking with the freshest of raw fish, and I loved it. It was so good that we
went there twice, and in retrospect having eaten during three weeks of travel
all over the country including Lima, I think this was one of the very best
tiraditos and ceviches we had in our entire trip. Chef José Luis was very
welcoming, and allowed me to join him in the kitchen to rustle up my own
tiradito. None of the dishes cost over £10, the restaurant is open to
non-residents, and I would recommend it as the top gastronomic destination for
anyone visiting Paracas.
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| Gracias Chef Jose Luis! |
For dinner, we had a tasting menu of
classic Peruvian dishes cooked by the Executive Chef himself, Franco Rivadeneyra. Our meal started with 4 types of Pisco sour - the
classic version with lime juice, and the others with mandarin, passion fruit or
chicha morada (Peruvian purple corn). These drinks were very refreshing, but
each very different, illustrating the surprising versatility of the Pisco grape
spirit that underpinned them all.
The amuse bouche of green asparagus
gazpacho with onion bread was bursting with concentrated asparagus flavour and
was almost chlorophyll green.
Next came a Tiradito of seabass with
avocado and lime sauce, gratinated scallops and Champagne foam. This was a great dish with some very cheffy
touches including tiny spherified pearls of Champagne.
To follow we had octopus, slow cooked then
grilled with purple corn, plantain mash and octopus reduction. This was a
superb dish, the octopus wonderfully tender yet with a deliciously smokey
flavour from the grilling. The chef explained that he slow-cooked the octopus
sous-vide to tenderise it before blasting it under the grill.
Our final fish dish was grilled seabass
with a purple potato crust, served with steamed Peruvian purple potatoes, and
the Andean herb huacatay (aka black mint). This was a very flavoursome dish
using authentic local ingredients, and the fresh huacatay gave it a wonderfully
aromatic lift.
The meat course was two dishes served
simultaneously - a bowl of Orzo pasta flavoured with an intense beef reduction,
and a rich, tender lamb stew with quail egg and yucca purée. The quail egg was
perfectly cooked- the white set firm but the yolk oozing seductively across the
lamb.
Dessert was a delectable trio of baked
custard apple, layered chocolate cake and rice pudding ice cream. Starters at the restaurant cost around £10,
with mains at £15. Some of the dishes we had were not on the official menu, but
Chef Franco is happy to create a similar tasting menu given 24 hours notice.
We were keen to try the local Peruvian wine
from the Ica region of which Paracas is a part. We opted for the Intipalka
Santiago Queirolo range, choosing a bottle of their 2012 Sauvignon Blanc, and
the 2011 Malbec (both at £33). With its warm winters and hot summers, Peru
struggles to make good wines but these were decent efforts well worth trying if
you are in the area. They do not yet rival the wines of Chile or Argentina, who
benefit from a much more favourable climate.
The restaurant at Hotel Paracas is very
good, and it is easy to understand why the residents of Lima visit so often and
have done so for generations. The Executive Chef Franco Rivadeneyra is still
just under 30 but has had wide-ranging training and experience in Peru and
Spain, and has an impressive range of cooking skills. The hotel's French
General Manager Bruno Giordano is also a chef by training, and indeed was the
head chef at Hotel Paracas before Franco. These two factors, I think, explain a
lot about why the food at the hotel is one of its strongest points.
What to Do
The Ballestas Islands
It is easy enough to fix up a visit to the
Ballestas Islands independently by visiting one of the many agencies in the
town. A two hour boat trip to the islands costs around £10 per person, and is
the thing to do while in Paracas.
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| The Candelabro Formation |
The islands are astounding, being packed with
wildlife including millions of birds as well as large packs of sea lions,
penguins and sometimes even dolphins. The birds include boobies, guano birds,
oyster catchers, cormorants and pelicans among many others.
Although it is
neither possible nor permitted to set foot on the islands, the boats get to
within a few metres of the wildlife, which makes for an exhilarating
experience.
The Hotel Paracas also arranges tours to
the Ballestas Islands, and since they leave from the hotel's private jetty,
they are more convenient and involve less queuing than the public boats from
the main town. They are a little more expensive at £18 per person, and are
available via the hotel's own agent, Tikariy.
Visit Nazca to Fly Over the Mysterious Nazca Lines
We travelled, as many people do, overland by
Cruz del Sur bus to Nazca to take a local flight over the lines. While there is little to do in Nasca apart from flying over the lines or visiting ancient cemeteries and the few remaining mummies, it is a good place to break up the long journey between Paracas and Arequipa, which was to be our next destination.
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| Cruz del Sur Buses - most popular transport method (when flying isn't an option!) |
The town of Nazca is small and quite sleepy, and there are no hotels to speak of. We had a homestay at the modest
Nazca House, the home of Senora Nancy. Nancy was very kind and attentive, and allowed us to keep our room for a very late checkout of 9pm as we had an overnight bus to catch that evening. On Calle Bolognesi off the main square is where all the restaurants and bars are. We had a couple of decent meals there at La Encantada.
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| Jallea - Deep Fried Seafood and Chips with a very Cold Beer at La Encantada |
The flight over the mysterious Nazca lines is short (30 minutes), but spectacular, and it is really the only way to begin to comprehend these extraordinary pre-historic and wonderfully artistic desert sculptures. They are still poorly understood complex zoomorphic designs that include massive abstract geometric forms, and more than 30 animals including the monkey, spider and humming bird. It is thought that they were religious offerings by the Nazca people to bring rain to the once fertile Nazca plains as they were turning into the desert seen today.
There were several fatal plane crashes over the lines in 2011-12, and since then a number of safety improvements have been made and some companies closed.
Aero Paracas has a good safety record, modern planes and two pilots per plane, and we had a very good flight with them.
Flights are best taken in the early morning around 8am while the sun is still low and the shadows accentuate the lines. One simple way to arrange the flight is to arrive at the airport at 07.30, go to the
Aero Paracas desk, and pay directly. The planes seat only 6 passengers and the flight can be choppy, so it is recommended to delay breakfast until after the flight.
For those who do not have time to travel to Nazca, it is also possible to charter a plane from Pisco airport near the Hotel Paracas for the one hour forty minute return flight to Nazca to see the lines from the air. Hotel Paracas' agency Tikariy can arrange this for a minimum of 7 people, at a cost of £160 per person.
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| Visit to Nazca's Local Fruit & Veg Market |
Paracas National Reserve
A full day trip can also be arranged which
includes exploration of the Ballestas Islands followed by the Paracas National
Park by boat. Here, along with great natural beauty of the marine landscapes,
it is possible to see the Andean condor, turtles, dolphins and flamingos.
Visit the Spa or Gym
The hotel's extensive spa building also
hosts the gym and dry sauna, which are free for guests.
For an extra charge,
guests can also access a large heated hydrotherapy pool with hydromassage, and
a range of spa treatments. These include Thai and Shiatsu massages and the
"Total Paracas" fusion treatment for £80.
Travel Essentials
Hotel Paracas
Avenida Paracas
Paracas
Peru
Rooms at Hotel Paracas cost around £190 per
double room per night.
Nazca House
Maria Reiche 308
11501 Nazca
Peru
info@nazcahouse.com
Rooms cost around £20 per night via
Booking.com.
Travel
There are several bus and coach operators
offering the route from Lima to Paracas. We opted for Cruz del Sur, a company
that runs quite luxurious air-conditioned double-decked coaches all over Peru.
The advantages are that it has a website in English from which it is possible
to purchase tickets on-line from overseas, and that the coach stations are
clean, well-organised and secure from the luggage thieves who can otherwise be
quite a problem in the country. They also serve better meals than we had on our
flight to Peru, with a well-known company that shall remain nameless!
A Cruz del Sur ticket from Lima to Paracas
costs £7.80 per person including lunch.
Flights over the Nazca Lines
AeroParacas
