Well, it`s been a while but you`ll probably be quite surprised to learn that this probably won´t be one of our longest entries as we haven´t really been doing an awful lot. We went back to Santiago from Valparaiso and stayed there for another 4 nights. Most of the time was spent in Santiago, doing jobs and things and some Christmas shopping on our last day there! We also visited a small village called Pomaire. We didn´t really know what to expect from it but I´d seen it advertised on a tour as an indigenous artesan village and thought it might be worth a look. Getting there was a bit of an adventure as we were dropped off the bus at the side of the main dual carriageway, by the exit to Pomaire and told that we just had to walk down towards Pomaire a bit to get a bus to the centre. Although we were a bit nervous of just being dropped at the side of what was almost a motorway, it was actually fine and all very easy.
The village itself did exactly what it said on the tin – every second `house´ was a craft type shop, with the majority of the goods being made out of pottery. There was some lovely stuff and it would be a great place to buy yourself a full 8 piece dinner service for under 20 pounds! There were also lots of lovely pots and things. Needless to say, we were unable to buy anything – our rucksacks are heavy enough without a couple of plates thrown in! We didn`t actually spend very much time there because although it was very nice, the things on sale were quite similar in most of the shops and as we couldn´t buy any of it, it wasn´t much fun!
We decided to get the bus to Melipilla, which was where the bus returned to Santiago from (we chickened out of flagging it down on the dual carriageway!). We also thought it might be nice to see another new place. It didn´t look hugely exciting though so we caught the bus back to Santiago almost straight away.
I think that´s about it for the rest of our stay in Santiago really, I don´t think we did anything else particularly exciting...
On Thursday 23rd, it was time to catch our bus for our mammoth 28 hour journey to Arica. We turned up at the bus station in plenty of time in the morning, grabbed a cup of tea and coffee and then went down to the platform. We´d been told to be there 15 minutes before the bus was due to leave (at 8:45) so when it hadn`t appeared at 8:40, I went to check with the guy in the office which platform it left from. He looked a little confused and as though he wasn´t expecting a bus to be leaving for Arica at 8:45, then got on his radio to someone, saying that he had a couple of people waiting for it...I was a little bit concerned but he said there wasn´t a problem and that we should wait by the platform so off I went. Chris wasn´t as reassured as me and managed to convince himself that the bus wasn´t going to turn up at all and that we would have to spend Christmas in Santiago rather than Arica. (Chris – OK, the correct version of events was like this – we turn up and there’s no sign of the bus so Sarah goes off to ask about it and comes back saying the bloke sounded very surprised to hear we were going to Arica as he couldn’t find the bus on the computer. He also asked a couple of colleagues who didn’t know anything about it either, and was also surprised that we were awaiting a cama bus as all the buses seemed to be semi cama only. When we bought the tickets the guy had been in a hurry as it was really busy so I thought he might have made a mistake. Also, all of the buses coming into the station were for Vińa and Valparaiso and were semi cama ones. When the 9:15 bus turned up and there was still no sign of ours I was a bit concerned. As it was the only bus that we have so far needed to get in order to be anywhere at a specific time I thought sods law might be playing a part too.) Sarah – that was Chris´ version of events anyway, although I don´t know where some of that came from! Of course, it did turn up, if a little late at 9:10 and we were away. Nothing much to tell you about the journey apart from the fact that it was long! It actually took about 27 hours in the end and we arrived in Arica at about 12:30 on Christmas Eve. (Chris – some of the scenery was quite pretty as we made our way up the Panamericana. It started off following the coast and finished up driving along the top of some spectacular desert valleys with very thin strips of green bushes along the bottom).
We got a taxi to our hotel and were really pleased with our decision. The hotel was really nice – reasonably small with 80 rooms and some chalets and the people were really friendly. Our room was fantastic with a beautiful view of the Pacific. We could hear the waves crashing against the rocks and smell the sea air whilst lying in bed with the air conditioning on! (Chris – It was also a great place to watch the sunset from while emptying the minibar of wine and beer!)
Our time in Arica was spent doing not very much apart from eating lovely meals and occasionally wandering along the beach and investigating rock pools! We also went up `El Morro´, which is a big hill overlooking the town with a big statue of Christ on top (yes, another one!). It was a bit of a hot walk up there but we got some lovely views of the city...oh, and we also went to McDonalds for the first time too – only to buy ice cream though :0) And I must mention the breakfast in the hotel – fantastic buffet! I think we both had 3 or 4 courses every day!
We had a nice Christmas day, although it never did feel very Christmassy...we both bought each other a few presents and opened them, hung a `Feliz Navidad´ banner up and also went to breakfast in our Santa hats (much to the amusement of the other hotel guests) so we did try!
We left Arica yesterday (Monday 27th) and were both sad to do so. We´re now in Iquique, which is about 4 hours by bus south of Arica. It seems to be quite a nice place, although this morning has been spent doing jobs again – we´ll hopefully get to explore a bit over the next couple of days. We´re also hoping to go to Humberstone, which is a ghost mining town with all the buildings apparently still almost perfectly intact, about 40km from here. We´ll let you know all about it next time.
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