South America

The scenery was amazing at Huacachina, driving up the coast with bright blue sea to one side and huge sand dunes to the other. We were off to an overnight desert stay.

Sleeping bags packed we jumped on a V8 engine dune buggy ready to explore the dunes. It seated 8, plus driver, and once strapped in, we sped off vertically, straight up into the dunes. Crazy fun, the driver was mad and loving it as much as us, the more I screamed and giggled, the faster and crazier he got. We never overturned the buggy but on various occasions we were on two wheels, or flying in the air after hitting the top of a dune too fast.

We stopped at the top of one dune to grab the Sand boards. This was the biggest dune I’d ever seen and perched at the top on your board you realised how high you actually were. Ok I thought, sands soft, it’ll be fine, off I went. I couldn’t stop screaming, but each time I opened my mouth my teeth and tongue got covered in sand, I never learnt my lesson, mouth open all the way down. I lost my balance towards the end of the dune and ended up rolling, I had sand in places I wish not to mention, my shorts were 4kg heavier with all the sand in the pockets and my nose, ears and mouth were miniature sand pits. Oh, it was good fun at the time, but I regretted my decision when I found out there were no showers.

We drove deeper into the desert to set up camp. This meant getting out the sleeping bag and lying it onto the sand, no tents; we were sleeping under the stars tonight. We lit the fire as the sun set and the desert chill set in. The guides got the BBQ going and we opened wine to warm our cockles.

One of the guides was going back into town to collect fire wood so a couple of begged to tag along for the ride. Dune buggies in the pitch black is the best fun ever. Although they have lights they don’t have a great beam, so you can only see approx 10m in front so you never quite know where you are or what’s next. To us it felt like we were zooming across the surface of the moon. At one point he turned off the lights as we hit the top of a dune, sheer brilliance, it got a rip roaring reaction from the passengers.

We headed back into the dunes for the BBQ and wine and all fell asleep where we sat, around the crackling fire and watching the stars. Sounds nice and peaceful, which it would have been if the male population didn´t snore their heads off after alcohol. No I don’t snore – Ollie hears things in his sleep.

I´m still finding sand now.