Settling down a bit

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From May 20th to May 22nd was a complete blur. After waiting all day in Calama I finally left the desert. The bus arrived into Iquique at 10:20pm. Finally I got a well-deserved win. Instantly I was able to get a ticket for Arica leaving at midnight. It was an hour and a half wait, but at that point it was a cake walk. I was just glad that I did not have to spend the night in Iquique.

The next bus ride was only four hours. Normally that would be a good thing, but due to the fact that it was in the midle of the night it was negative. I slept for maybe two hours before getting woken up by the attendent. We were in Arica. It was four in the morning. The bus terminal was closed. It was dark outside. I knew that there was a bus leaving for Tacna, Peru at 7:00am. I was tired and did not want to stay on the dark streets of Arica in fearing of getting robbed.

It was not a fun three hour wait. Just before 7:00am I met a girl from Japan who spoke decent English and bad Spanish. I am quite sure she spoke to me simply becuase I looked like I spoke English. She did not seem to have a plan of where she was going. A man came up to me asking if I needed to go to Peru. It must have been a lucky guess, because that is exactly what I needed. He asked the girl as well. She made a seemingly unsure decision to go as well.

After a half an hour or so we piled into a taxi with four others plus the driver. The border was about 45 minutes away. This was just another experience that told me I was in South Ameirca. I was crossing international borders in a tiny taxi full of seven people. At the border they asked me for the stamped paper I had gotten when I came into Chile two days ago. I did not have it. Fortunantely I was able to show my Chilean residentail card.

In Tacna the Japanese girl and I got a bus to Arequipa. I wanted to go there because that is the jump off point ot Colca Canyon. We got to Arequipa at 3:00pm. I was too tired to do much exploring. We got a hostel, went to dinner, and then I fell asleep at 7:00pm. I did not wake up until 8:30am. I had slept 13.5 hours, and still was a little tired. I probably first woke up at 7:00ish thinking it was about 10:00am.

Up until this point I had been having good luck with the buses. Since the whole Calama situation I was able to go from one bus to another without spending the night anywhere. My luck had run out. There was no bus to Colca Canyon for Monday. I would have to wait until Tuesday. I spend today wandering the town, buying a tour package for Colca Canyon, and getting a $1.60 haircut. I appreciate how everything is cheap in Peru. The bad side of this is that I only got 100 soles bills fromt the ATM. Since most things only cost between 1-10 soles they will not give change. Today I had to buy more food than I wanted at a mini mart just so I could get change. Also, a vendor turned down my coin, because the engraved image and number was almost rubbed out.

It is now the evening of Monday, May 23rd. I am set to leave for Colca Canyon tomorrow morning. That will occupy all my time until my parents arrived. Finally I have a set plan. Everything is arranged. I can now relax, enjoy the sites of Colca Canyon, and let my parents do the rest of the planning. I have been abroad for five months, and completely on my own for a month. For now that is enough. Time to reunite with my family.

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