PERU. Ica. November 22, 2010. Members of a Peruvian-French-Italian-Belgian Paleontology expedition into the Ocucaje Desert use a makeshift crane to lift the fossilized skull of an ancient whale that lived approximately 35 million years ago after finding it on a remote stretch of the Ocucaje Desert. This desert, once covered by the ocean in ancient times, has the largest marine fossil deposits in the world, some dating anywhere from 8 to 20 million years ago.