Nazca Lines

In Nazca, we met an English speaking Peruvian astronomer named Edgar. Edgar owns a small planetarium which shows a short movie on the Nazca lines and offers some awesome stargazing! During the movie, the walls of the planetarium switched between showing stars and the Nazca lines. The show explained Maria Reiche's work with the lines and the various theories behind the lines. So for those of you who don't know what the lines are, they are petroglyphs in the desert. Basically, they are shallow designs made in the ground by removing the desert's red rocks and uncovering the white/gray ground below. The lines have remained intact because it doesn't rain enough in the desert to ruin the lines. There are HUNDREDS of simple lines and geometric shapes, over 70 design of animals, birds, fish, llamas, jaguars, monkeys, and humans + other designs like trees and flowers. My personal favorite is Hands. To sum up the interpretations, the lines could indicate flow of water, match up with star formations, be fertility symbols, and or may be part of a calendar. After the show, Edgar took us outside to look at the sky through his extremely powerful telescope. He showed us the rings of Jupiter and the moon. The show was super informative and I highly suggest that people go to his show before seeing the Nazca lines. After the show, we walked to a vegetarian restaurant for dinner and along the way stopped at a little artesanel stall. The man offered Mike and I "friendship rocks." I also posted a few photos of the lines.

The rotating lines/stars

An example of how the lines match up with star formations

The moon!

Our friendship rocks

Trapezoids

Ballena-Whale

Astronaut

Mono-Monkey (Look top middle, the lines are part of it too though)

Perro-Dog or Zorro-Fox

Picaflor-Hummingbird

Spider

Hands- My favorite!!!