Monday October 6 – Arica, Chile
A road sign on the Pan-American Highway, the main street of Arica, says “Western Frontier – 3 km”. That is the border with Peru. 135 miles NE of Arica is the border with Bolivia. The tour guide said that there have been “trouble with the maps for many years”. What he was saying euphemistically was that The Western part of Chile used to be Peru and Bolivia has claimed for the last number of decades the road corridor from their land-locked country to the port of Arica, Chile. So I took an all day tour the 129 miles up this well paved but very mountainous road to 15,000 foot high Lake Chungara in the Lauca National Park. A number of 20,000 foot volcanoes, some active, surround the late along with alpacas, llamas, vicunas, and various other Andean beings apparently sent by central casting. (The only exception was two guys with fur hats playing Simon and Garfunkel’s La Condor Passe on panpipes. We were told they are all busking around the world. Insert laugh here.) We left on one of two buses—one was reserved in case of a breakdown in the driest desert in the world—at 8:30 am and drove for a 4 hours across the 12,500 foot plus high Chilean Altiplano. We did stop for the obligatory quite lovely local church and a roadside restaurant in which we had “herbal tea”. The herb was coca which the guide said would help us to adjust to the altitude. While I am refraining from making fun of my fellow guests for fear of reinforcing the incorrect impression that the experience of this cruise is marred by the other guests—it is not, making fun of some of the say less sophisticated travelers is part of the fun—I have to mention that a few of my fellow tour excursion goers wanted to buy “those wonderful leaves” and bring them back with them to the US. One lady mentioned that she didn’t like the tea at first but found it most enjoyable as she drank it. She said she wanted to buy some of “those fantastic leaves” to take back home to San Diego. She said, “How wonderful this is. I go up to the Palm Springs in the mountains, you know, and the tea is also good for you.” You betcha. Beats the little bags of nitrate from Tuesday’s visit to a nitrate ghost town, but that’s for the next installment.
The tour was to one of the most beautiful mountain places I’ve ever been, the guide—who unfortunately seemed to suffer from ADHD (or lots of healthful herbal tea) and was definitely off his meds—was quite knowledgeable when he wasn’t singing to himself or otherwise climbing the walls of the bus, a really nice stop for lunch in a local restaurant in a remarkably pleasant mountain town at 11,750 feet MSL had wonderful epinatas made with meat from don’t ask meat, and a short tour of the town with two buildings designed by pre-tower Eiffel, including a beautiful church, made for a really fantastic day. We had a barbeque on deck while watching a local university’s traditional dance troupe perform. This appeared to be members of a no doubt credit course for some really talented and very young kids who performed beyond their allotted time and got quite unceremoniously disembarked as the spring lines were being released and the gangway was being dismantled. We sailed out of Arica after a striking sunset, still feeling good from that nice tea. This was the day that got me to book the trip. It met all expectations.
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