Apr 1, 2009 | root_ks8kzico

Mummies and Me

Condor face A while back I was looking around the deserts of southern Peru when I came to this small military outpost. I stopped at the mess tent to ask the soldiers questions about stuff they might have seen on patrols into the desert. I noticed that they had a young condor tied by the foot that they would feed scrapes of meat to from the cook tent. In the picture you can see the bird jumped up on my leg thinking I might have something for it to eat. I did not, but the bird thought the image printed on my t-shirt might be worth a bite. In one and a half seconds that little buzzard grabbed the cloth an inch below my collar and ripped the entire front of my t-shirt off.

Nazca mummies, Peru

Now, on to the other photos, I asked the guys what kind of interesting things they had run into out in the desert back towards the mountains. They told me about a lot of stuff but when one of the guys told me he had seen through his binoculars what he thought was mummies, he got my attention. The guys were at the end of their day patrol and hadn’t had a chance to walk the extra five miles over to check out what the guy with the glasses had seen. I pulled out a map and had the guy show me where he had seen the bodies. I drove to a nearby town and found a guy who let me rent a dirt bike.

Nazca lady mummy, PeruNazca skull, Peru

   

Up Next...

Photo of the Month: July 2026
A special sighting of a range-restricted monkey which I personally really wanted to see, the Geoffroy’s tamarin, that seemed to have a lot to say, in the Darién of Panama that the group enjoyed watchi
Photo of the Month: June 2026
This past summer, I led a group of students from the Pedro Menendez High School Academy of Future Healthcare Professionals on a medical outreach adventure to Costa Rica. I was looking for a way to exp

Why choose Holbrook?

We’ve been
coordinating travel
programs since 1974.

Custom-Tailored Trips
Safety & Security
24/7/365 Service
Knowledgeable Staff
Expert Guides
Rich Content

Want to hear about upcoming trips?

Sign up for our newsletter and get the latest updates on upcoming trips, deals, and more. 

CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.