09.4 Crossroads

Next morning, at breakfast, Madeleine tiredly referred to a map and screamed on top of her voice, “NAZCA LINES! WE ARE GOING THERE! LOOK AT THIS! NAZCA LINES!”

“What are Nazca Lines?”

“Aliens came down on earth and drew those lines up on the mountains. I don’t know if we can see them. But if we’re going there, we have to start now. Ten hours from here!” She stubbed the butt in an ashtray.

“You’re excited,” hinted Marina.

“What did you say the other day? There is beauty in halfway…”

“We must cross that line!”

Madeleine sat jaw-dropped.

They killed it on a second consecutive day of non-stop driving. They arrived in Nazca at nine in the night. Twelve hours after leaving Punta. Found a beautiful hotel and booked in. Plumerias and palm trees in the forefront and green grass carpeted the lawn.

“Look at those lines,” she whispered to Marina, “on the tablecloth!”

“What lines?” browsed Marina.

Looking up at a framed portrait on the wall, she hissed, “Alien!” And the door banged behind their back. She jumped out of fright.

Marina scoffed.

There lay two striking swimming pools side by side in the garden lawn. They decided to spend one more day here.

Madeleine nictated at the headboard of the bed, “Those lines again!” Cast iron shaped to form two Celtic crosses – with rings – on the bed frame.

Marina shrugged, “It is the Cross!”

“A cross!”

They sniggered and Madeleine coughed caught with smoke in her lungs.

Both went out for a stride and stepped in the main square. There again, she was right, those lines appeared everywhere. The streets fallen silent and beautiful brick houses stood side by side.

Again, this beauty was completely destroyed in 1996 in a massive earthquake.

“Peaceful around here!” she shuddered in a shiver, “Do you know the time?”

“Two in the morning,” returned Marina glancing at her wristwatch that she collected from Madeleine’s belongings.

Of course, they learnt those lines could be viewed from an observation tower on Panamericana some 25 kilometres from Nazca.

Mirador de Las Lineas de Nazca was a metal tower that stood on the western side of the highway, consisting of four staircases and thirteen metres high. Maximum ten persons at a time allowed to climb up paying thirty soles each.

As they paused for tickets, Madeleine pinched on Marina’s bum and pointed at a garbage bin in a whisper, “Look at that!”

“What is it?” asked Marina in a hiss.

“Some kind of an instrument fixed here to record alien activity,” defined Madeleine in a rustling voice.

They reached the top with binoculars and observed the lines in the buffeting desert wind. Three visible; The Hand, The Tree and The Lizard out of many geoglyphs covering an area of sixteen square miles out of sight.

It was a gorgeous afternoon and had a spectacular panoramic view of the desert land. Unfortunately, the Lizard’s tail got caught and crushed under the highway, not that she tried to cross the road, instead – vice versa.

When they drove towards Ica through miles of flat desert land, they could not make the colour of the vehicle as it was covered of dust. It rained before they reached Ica and the dust turned to dirt. They had lunch and set on the journey towards Pisco, a little town on the coast. Drove off the Panamericana and entered the town.

There were many hostals here. A peaceful place with a lively nature of birds. Lodged in at an inn with a garden of pot plants, white oleanders, bougainvillea and grapes, thriving in the harshness of heat. The pair was shown to a twin room and they demanded a double. Again, the double bed was so narrow but good enough to sleep in it. They hired a guy to clean the car and went for a walk around the plaza. Another gorgeous atmosphere.

In bed that night, Marina queried, “Any interesting games tonight! This town is called Pisco. Did you notice it?”

“Let’s play the spitting game! I spit and you spit. The one who gets cross first, loses.” Madeleine sat with her boobs exposed without a shirt.

“No, I don’t want to play that game.”

Madeleine spat on her face and Marina spat back. They grabbed each other and dropped in bed. They rolled and stumbled down to the floor.

“Let’s play pisco!”

They passed the coastal town of Asía, quite a modern town with exclusive holiday resorts.

Marina maintained her eyes on the road on the northbound of Panamericana. As they passed the greenery around Puente Mala, Madeleine got busy with the potty pee bottle.

“I AM STARVING!”

“We stop there,” Marina drove towards a row of canteens and stopped the vehicle on a beachside. A scenic spot with water, beach, mountains, boulders and the road.

Madeleine peeked pulling on her pants, “Have we passed the intersection?”

“We did” replied Marina, “Puente Mala.”

“We flooded Panamericana, right!”

They climbed down and negotiated the two lanes of highway to the beach. Madeleine and Marina blown of hair on their faces in the seaside breeze. A saline odour knocked them at once and dehydrated quickly in the winds. They settled for lobster and white wine.