El Kiwi en Sudamérica

The Trip...

So, I went to the bus station at around about 9 on the morning of the 18th of December, to leave a city that had been so good to me. No problems with the bus, a 6-7 hour trip to La Serena. The trip up was fairly uneventful, the same dry, suprisingly deserty terrain (the cactus were Bacán but nothing else was of interest really).
I arrived in La Serena at around about 4 in the afternoon, found my accomadation just across the road from the bus station, and then went for soemthing to eat, then afterwards for a walk around the beach. I was hopeing to find some 'action' around the beach, some night life, but I guess Mondays don't feature on the social calendars of La Serenaens. So, after a big walk around and a cold sea breeze coming in (I didn't bring a jersey, it's summer, right?). But the next day was great weather, I headed off around 11ish and spent all afternoon at the beach, until I had to catch the bus to Iquique at 6ish. I'd grade La Serena a B- Quite a nice beach (extremly long, which is good in the busy times of year) but it's hard to judge when everything is so quiet, I can tell that around the peak period it'd be great fun, places would actually be open etc.)
The bus to Iquique was one of epic proportions, 18 hours (Demasiado largo yo creo, eso es la razón que no me gusto la viaje) in a Semi Cama bus... But I somehow slept, but it wasn't anything close to what I'd call quality sleep.
So, I arrived in Iquique, famous for its casino, its beaches and for its immense Duty free zone. The first two hostels I tryed to find weren't where the guide said they were, but on the way to the next option I encountered a residencial (kinda like a budget Motel) so I went in there (I had been walking with my heavy bags for around a half an hour, so I just needed to find somewhere) And they gave me a room with like 4 beds and cable for around 15 NZ dollars a night (not bad value I thought). But It didn't have an ensuite unfourtunatly. After that I went off to get a feed, then to the beach! The beach was nice, fairly quite, the weather wasn't amazing but it was nice. So I spent the afternoon there, I went back for a walk in the evening again but still not much was happening (except for a big christmas market thing, where I bought a mean as brazil beach towel) and that I found out that next door to the place I was staying was "las chicas de la Harem" which I hadn't noticed before (as the sigh was higher up and it didn't really grab my attention) and it sounded as if it was fairly busy... and I could hear music when I was in my room- so next time I don't think I'll stay there!) . The thursday was good though, I started by going to the duty free zone, which would have been fun if I had money!
They had like hundreds of little shops selling everything from Electronics, cloths, booze, things for cars- pretty much anything. Afterwards I went to the beach, and the weather was mint! The waves were sooo goood as well. I tryed abit of bodysurfing in the waves, but I didn't have to much luck with that- they were kinda hard to judge and, even though they weren't that high, they were very powerful (I got throw around in some of them, hahaha, great times...)
So, after yet another good day at the beach, I took all my things to the bus station at around about 6.30. My bus was late (only 20 minutes or so) for some reason which was a pain (and the first time i'd encountered that in Chile) so I arrived in Arica later than I wanted. But things didn't work out too bad because just as I left the bus station a man asked in English if I needed a place to stay which worked out good- pretty good value, very close to the station, a host who helped out with some advice and, most importantly, close to one of the beaches. So, I went for a walk around, I had quite possibly one of the most complete completos ever (there buns were quite abit bigger than the usual, so they could load it up with even more avocado, tomato and other fillings) and for the first time on my trip I bumped into a discoteca that was open, so I went in and found out it was really empty. So I waited around for a while, had a few drinks, bumped into a scary dude who had issues and eventually left because it was boring and nothing was happening (and it was a far too old crowd for my liking... traveling by yourself does have quite a few downsides).
The next day was more of the same really, chilling at the beach (it was the roughest out of all of them, but nice all the same) and I headed of to the international terminal to catch a 'collectivo' (a car that, like a bus, has a set route) to Tacna, Peru (Peru baby!). I was thinking that this was gonna be one of those difficult situations where i'd have no idea what I was suppossed to do. However my fears were dispeled when at the entrance alot of drivers were trying to fill up there cars, so they were asking me instead.
I choose to go with this one guy, and while we were waiting for the paperwork/more passengers this guy from China who has been living in NY for the last few years came with us. Which worked out good, esp. for him because he had some problems at the border and he know like, no spanish. So that was abit of a mission. It was funny to see the contrasts in border control between my other border experiance- at the border between Chile and Argentina they had all that declaration rigmarole/ xrays etc. but at the Peru border we walked though the Xray room, and out the other side just to follow protocol, even though the machine was broken! Hahahaha, but that went fairly smoothly. Arriving in Tacna though was another thing. There were alot of people hanging around the bus-station to 'help' of course (and fair enough) for a fee. And I guess that when they saw me they thought 'money', if only that was true hahaha. So this dude helped me get a ticket and a hostel with this other guys hanging around.
It was weird for them I guess because we had a chat and I don;t think they get that very often, and they were like "come out for a drink afterwards" very insistently, like "we'll be here at 8" which kinda spooked me out, and this guy I thought was a fellow passenger said, those guys are crazy, come out with me (which sounded like a far better idea, he seemed really nice) so I went for a few quiets with him and one of the other guys turned up too, and, as it turns out, he worked at the terminal! But things were going ok I thought. But, to make a log story short the guys scammed me by fabricating a bill, and by not having any money to pay there half, and the ran off pretty much leaving me with 75 cents NZ to get back, and that got me really angry (I was ticked during it too, because I could see what they were doing, but I didn't know how to back out- In hind site I do, but thats always 20/20 as they say. But some people at the bar helped me out (some were just as scary hahaha) by giving me another 50 cents to get back home on the taxi. But God was good to me despite what happened... Things could have been worse. I got back safe enough to my hostel, really annoyed at myself. So if you see a Peruvian guy called Victor you know what to do to him...
The next day went a whole lot better, once I found out were to board my bus. I was sitting by this nice guy Rudolfo, and we had a good chat on the way. The problem was that we got a flat tire, so we were over an hour late. But it wasn't too bad in the bus, as they played some movies (including Bruce Poderoso, or Bruce Almighty in English) so they trip wasn't too bad, and there weren't any chickens sitting beside me, or even on the bus! By the time we arrived at the bus station I was getting abit worried, as I had sorted out with Anthony the night before over the phone when I'd arrive- and I was 1.5 hours late. So i got out the bus, and when I didn't find him in the first two minutes started to think of what I would need to do if I couldn't find him (why I didn't get a cellphone number I don't know) anyway, after about 10 minutes I saw him, and everything worked out all right. But suprisingly they had dropped me off at the wrong station (instead of the one across the road) and Anthony was just checking across there just in case. So I arrived, shattered, stopped by at the Greens place before going to my accomadation (down the road with Anthony's brother-in-law and his family- another familia Bacán) so I slept very well that night... If you made it through this post, all power to you- as you can probably see it somewhat served the purpose of letting me get some things off my chest!
Tune in soon for the lowdown on times in Arequipa.
Nos Vemos,

Nathan

see below, as I've kinda just done a double post...

posted by Nathan Sinclair @ 8:58 PM