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Published: March 9th 2014
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5 March 2014 – Wednesday – Arica to Iquique, Chile
Notes: Morning bus through Atacama Desert to Iquique. Lunch Menu del Dia at Oasis. Joan retired to beach and I walked the downtown. Main street with many wooden clapboard buildings, some in shameful disrepair; wooden boardwalk. Very hot.
The bus trip from Arica to Iquique took 5 hours, passing through the Atacama Desert in which nothing grows. It claims to be the driest desert in the world. When you think of Chile you do not think of deserts, but a large percentage of Chile is desert. The Atacama Desert is over 1000 kilimetres long and we will be travelling through all of it.
We had not heard of Iquique before yesterday. We had been planning on going straight to Antofagasta but Joan was having a difficult time finding reasonably priced accommodation, and the twelve hour bus journey there sounded daunting, so she located this coastal city in between and did a bit of research and we decided it might be a good place to stop for a couple nights.
We arrived and caught a cab to the hotel on the opposite side of the city. The coach
into the city had stopped in a built up area. A few people disembarked. We couldn’t see the sea but the timing was right and the bus was going through to Antofagasta. We thought we perhaps had missed our stop. Joan went down to the conductor to inquire. He followed her back up to the upper deck and pushed away a large curtain and gestured to the modern looking city below the cliff top on which the bus was travelling and said ‘Iquique’ with a grand sweeping gesture and a bright smile!
Iquique, however, has not much to smile about: it is a dry, dirty, dusty and dingy city of about 200,000 people. It is an old mining town and many of its buildings are built from wood and the streets look as though they were imported from the American Southwest.
After a nice menu of the day lunch at Oasis, Joan headed for the beach and I walked into the town centre. I was quite fascinated by all the western wooden buildings. One of the streets even had a wooden boardwalk. I took lots of photos!
The main square, Plaze Prat, was surrounded on three sides
by various banks. The fourth side was an early 1900s Moorish building that was the municipal theatre. The building next to it was another building of the same era that had been turned into a bar. I went in and had a Chilean beer and watched the first half of a soccer friendly between Germany and Chile. There were four customers in the bar and five staff persons, all watching the match.
I met up with Joan and we went to Carpe Diem for a light dinner and happy hour: the sign said 3 beers for 5000 pesos! We shared a plate of Mexican enchaladas that were okay and Chilean beers. (We only received two as the happy hour special was for Heineken - no thanks!) The service was quick and very friendly. We used the wifi for about 90 minutes and wandered back to our bed at the Velero Boutique Hotel reasonably content with our day.
Trip Advisor: Velero Boutique Hotel - This small hotel is a little distance from the historical center (they claim only 2km but it seemed longer when walking to it in the hot sun). The rooms were brightly decorated and clean. The
staff don’t speak English but were helpful. It is very near the beach called Playa Brava but there are a lot of down-and-outs there; we preferred the beach called Playa Cavancha which is closer to the historical center and had sun umbrellas and lounge chairs to rent. The staff allowed us to put some things in their fridge to keep cold. It is a compact hotel; the stairway to the second floor is very narrow. We were exhausted and slept well.
6 March 2014 – Thursday – Iquique, Chile
Notes: Unsuccessful search for breakfast; Coffee and pastries in Coffee Bowl; Ticket for Bus to Antofagasto; Spanish Renovated Ship; Main Square – three sides banks, one side municipal theatre and restobar; No churches; walk back down mining street; afternoon at beach; supermarket.
We rose early and walked into town in search of breakfast. Joan had read a few reviews about a place called the Nomadesert as being ‘the best cafe in Chile’ and ‘one of the best coffee spots in Iquique’. We found it easily enough and sat down to look through the menu. We struggled to find anything resembling breakfast, and the loud pounding nightclub music drove
us onward instead. We found a nice little place nearby called the Coffee Bowl where we had a very good coffee, full-flavoured fresh-squeezed fruit juice, and a small bowl of miniature pastries to share, and used the wifi. I showed Joan the board-walk street and old wooden clapboard buildings in need of repair and a fresh coat of paint from Iquique’s mining past. As we walked around the city Joan noticed that there were no churches! In every South American city and town we have been in in the past 10 weeks there have been many churches and cathedrals, yet here there were none! Joan is not very keen on these brown and dusty mining towns so we went to the Tur Bus office to purchase our tickets for our next day’s journey south to Antofagasta and then we spent the afternoon at the beach.
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