We’ve been herded back to the car, bundled into the back with our bags.

Speeding. Speeding. Running with the clock. Time is money and time ticks on.

Lunch … quickly. Back in the car. Speeding towards the town of Ica. Quick drive-through. Browns and reds blur with faces as we pass. Awesome light. Indescribable. My hands itch as they wrap around my camera. I want to get out of the car. I need to. I want to walk, soak up the light, the place, the people, the colours, the smells. But on we speed. Earthquake damage everywhere. Total devastation. How does one begin to pick up the pieces? Start over? How do you go to sleep at night, wake up in the morning, tend to children, carry on with the business of being? Weary, blankfaced people selling food from makeshift stalls, perched amidst the rubble. Their homes have caved in and they’re living in tents, but the everydayness of life wears on. People with spades shovelling bricks and dust from road. No rush. Just keep moving. There’s so much to do, it will take forever with just a spade anyway. Just keep moving. It’s better than just sitting.

Taxis, cars, scooters, all criss-crossing one another, hooting incessantly, the evening light glinting off them. Brightly coloured three-wheeled scooter taxis charging everywhere, blurs of red, yellow, green.

The sun is setting over the desert. Big deep red-orange-amber sky with palm trees silhouetted against it. Photo opportunities whizzing by as we overtake two trucks at the same time. Bulleting ahead on the Trans American Highway.