The Nitrate Story

Tuesday, 7 October – Iqueque, Chile

 

It’s really, really dry here, but it’s a humid dryness. There’s only 0.10 inch of rain per year, and they haven’t had any rain in about 10 years here in Iqueque. Still high 50s, humid, and hazy in the morning in town and witnessed a fantastic sunrise as the sea lions cavorted or maybe swam like hell away from the ship. Seems like most of Peru and Chile so far is, uh, quite dry otherwise. After the long day in the bus yesterday, I didn’t even consider a tour for today. But the lovely setting of Iquique (which means, “I have two Que’s”, according to the guide. More about this, read on) a very prosperous beach resort city with lots of brand new high rise condos or apartment buildings and a quite lovely but somehow looking a bit artificial downtown somehow got me to venture to the Tour Desk on the ship to enquire about the 4 hour tour. 15 minutes later I was on the bus with a number of my fellows from yesterday’s tour (no doubt still glorying in the aftereffects of that herbal tea) who had also booked, “The Nitrate Story – A trip to the Past: Humberstone”. We climbed the cliff on another extremely well kept road and crossed a brand new community that looked remarkably like Henderson, Nevada, even to the 2500 to 3500 foot elevation and of course the desert setting. The guide said, “it doesn’t rain at all, and nothing lives here.” I think he meant outside of town. Hard to say since his English seemed to be very poor. He’s say things like “white topsoil on the bottom floor is salt” and other sentences that took some diagramming. He proceeded to explain during the hour long drive to the ghost town of Humberstone about nitrate. He said that this substance was the cause of many wars, the purpose of the port town of Iqueque which really means “place of rest and tranquility” or “lazy” depending on which authoritative source you consult. Unfortunately, it became clear that the guide didn’t know much when he didn’t know what color the ground deposits of nitrate is, what was the method of mining, or even what nitrate was. This caused me to conclude that his grip of English was perfectly adequate for his knowledge of the topic but we might be not getting full value for the “Nitrate Story”. Fortunately he had an assistant, a lovely middle aged woman who was a nurse in Toronto for 8 years. I hung out at the back of the group chatting with her for the tour and found that asking her questions and getting full and answers from someone whose family still lives in the area and was associated with the mine was a lot more fun and probably more factual.

 

Humberstone (if the truth be known I booked the tour because I realized that my remaining stops in South America would not allow for any more trips into the desert or mountains, my recurred slight cold seemed to be relieved by the dry and warmer temperatures up high, and I really really liked the name Humberstone) turned out to be an upscale and quite complete “company town”. Although the mine closed down in 1959 (or 1960 according to the same guide who might have said “nine T-shirts”), the town has been preserved by the Chilean government as a kind of closed company town museum. The flowers in the town square are well watered, the large theater and church is completely preserved along with the outdoor lighted tennis courts, stores, food market, etc., a even some remnants of their mine railway. We returned to town after a couple of hours walking around the ghost town, then around downtown Iqueque (which included being led in one door and out another of a tourist gift shop, no doubt the proprietor a relative of the guide), and a stop at a restaurant that was a dead ringer for the Alhambra in Granada, Spain for mango sours with snacks of chicken (or some sort of small animal that tastes like chicken) skewers and olives. And olives? The time and itinerary was well worth it, but the cost of tour of $122 will be the subject of a mass protest as no one has yet figured out the cause of the 50% refund from the last cruise. So is the way of the seafarer.

 

OK, I can’t hold it in any more. See, there’s this couple from New Zealand on the ship since Los Angeles. They have the most unhappy expressions on their faces ALL THE TIME. They come to the shows—even sitting up front—have dinner in the upscale restaurant onboard, go on most tours offered, and talk to no one very much. But, my oh my, they are unhappy looking. So, I’ve as well as others have tried to engage them in conversation. It turns out they are the MOST UNHAPPY PEOPLE ANY OF US HAVE EVER MET on a cruise. After comparing notes with a few other guests on the ship, we have discovered that while she might (that’s ‘might’ mind you) respond to a question with a two or three word response, he invariably makes a crack about how whatever country you are from has screwed up the world for everyone. He even complained to me about some trade issue during the American Civil War that hurt England or The Baltic. I forget which. This guy is carrying a lot of grudges. I’ve included a photo of these “dour folks” as a delightful Scotsman onboard called them (but he pronounced the word as “dew-er”. I like this guy, though, a lot) with the shot including one of the Tour Desk helpers, a young woman from Russia who is a few mountain ranges short of the Urals. Don’t ask her if they will load water bottles on the bus for the tour or if you will need to bring one yourself from the ship as she will answer, “Water for drinking is good in hot weather”, and only after a lot, really a lot, of thought. A few of the older women on the ship just shake their heads and say something like “Poor thing” whenever her name is mentioned.

 

Tomorrow I will report on my 3 hour tour of “Antofagasta City & Surroundings.” All I know is Antofagasta was also big in nitrates. By the way, I wanted to jump in when our guide didn’t know what nitrate mining was and told everyone that it is found with glycerin and sulfur. I wanted to say that it’s usually found on the ground wrapped in red paper and has a piece of rope coming out the end. Maybe I’d got the Nobel Prize for being a wiseass. (Get it?) But yesterday, when our ADHD inflicted guide didn’t give any precautions for our spending a few hours at 14,000 to 15,200 feet, I asked for the microphone and warned my fellows to take it really easy and report immediately a splitting headache and also to be aware that they would feel pretty good until that happened. Unaccustomed to lecturing cruise passengers that I am, I decided to keep my mouth shut today. I really must be sick with this cold.

 

Opps. Tea time. Maybe they’ll have that wonderful herbal tea.

 

Back from tea which I missed as I decided instead to watch another local university’s student group on the dock as the kids performed the “devils and angels dance”. This dance, which was performed on around the pool during our barbeque last night, starts out with a group of devils usually played by or signifying the male population taking center stage. Then the “angels” led by a beautiful girl dressed in white (yesterday’s had a led laden orb on her mace, make of that what you will) who leads the other angels into a seduction of the devils. Eventually the music becomes a lot more jazzy than military, all the angels and devils dance together, and then the angels lead the devils out who have now become quite submissive. Make all of that what you will. After we watched this dance and discussed the bearings on modern interpersonal relationships (must have been the lingering effects of the mango sours of this morning) we sailed out of the harbor as the local fishing fleet was coming in. Dolphins and sea lions scampered or is it cavorted, and one of the four of us “younger” folks (actually I’m the oldest of this group of singles who have somehow managed to find each other) waved to the harbor pilot as he stepped gingerly onto the pilot boat. Much to our surprise, the pilot—who had gotten onto Silver Shadow’s bridge for only enough time to watch the lines being released and to point out to sea and say “aqui”—waved back. So we applauded him which resulted in the pilot boat sounding its whistle and then our ship responding in kind in a sort of ad hoc farewell ceremony that we had started. Apparently, we are the only cruise ship to call at Iqueque, Chile is quite a while. Not quite as good as a tugboat doing pirouettes for us, but nice nevertheless. I will remember this stop even longer than the port’s dead fish smell which somehow got into the ship’s ventilation system clears as we head out to sea.