San Pedro de Atacama and the border crossing to Peru: February 2016
San Pedro de Atacama.
It was so hot in San Pedro de Atacama! We had gone from cold to uncomfortably hot! We didn’t have any lodging, so before we left the bus stop to find a place, we booked our ticket to Arequipa, planned to meet with our friends for lunch, and walked to the town center in search of accommodation. Did I mention it was hot?? We couldn’t find wifi anywhere, and ended up settling on an internet cafe to look up hotels. We quickly found one, and walked the mean streets of San Pedro de Atacama to get there. On the way, we passed by many people we had seen on the tour. Most were from the children’s table. We just kept on walking. When we arrived to our hotel, we were nervous that they didn’t have air-conditioning, but the room was actually very nice in a small-town lodge kind of way. We took much needed showers and found a non-tourist place for lunch, which was no easy task. San Pedro de Atacama is one of those places that probably couldn’t survive without tourism. There are definitely more tourists than locals. This can sometimes be annoying, but we’ve learned that there are definitely some positives to places like these. Most importantly, they tend to have a wide variety of food options, and you’re bound to find one or two that are just exceptional, which is just what we did. After walking the town and taking pictures, we found a tourist restaurant for dinner. It was the best food we had eaten since leaving Cusco.
San Pedro de Atacama.
We didn’t really do anything in San Pedro de Atacama. We left the next day, but not until the evening. After checking out of our hotel, we tried to sit in the lobby and blog, but it was so hot, we were melting into the chairs. We packed up our stuff, stored our luggage, and tried to find a coffee shop or some place with a breeze. Well, everyone else had the same idea, so we were out of luck. After returning to our previous night’s dinner spot for lunch, we headed back to our hotel, to lose some water weight.
When it was time to go, we strapped on our packs, and walked to the bus station. Our overnight bus was nice and cool, although we were in the back and could smell the exhaust. We were convinced we would die of carbon monoxide poisoning, so we opened the window a crack, much to the displeasure of the people in front of us. At 6am, we arrived in Arica. We had read about this in several blogs, but it’s always so different when you try it in person.
We were told to take the colectivo to the boarder. What they don’t tell you is that the colectivo doesn’t start running until 8am, nor that the colectivo is actually not “across the street” but down the street. After asking around and dodging sketchy people trying to hustle right outside the station, we found our destination. From there, we learned that the buses would not start running until 8am. We could wait, or take a taxi.
Peru!
The taxis waited until they were full before taking off, and the price was not that much more than the listed price of the buses.
It took about 45 minutes to reach the border. As soon as we crossed, we gained 2 hours, which made much more sense. When we arrived, the sun had just started to rise, and according to Chile, it was well after 8am. Crossing into Peru was a breeze, and we were whisked on to Tacna, where we caught our next bus to Arequipa- 6 hours away. While it was a long trip, we slept well, which instantly ranks it towards the top of bus experiences.
Arequipa: February 2016
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Arequipa, Peru.
The White City! We ate, and ate, and ate some more. The famous dish in Arequipa is rocoto relleno con pastel de papas, which is a basically a stuffed pepper, with a baked potato cheese thing, but so much better. We’ve both had rocoto relleno before, especially Javier. You’re probably thinking…how good can stuffed peppers be?? And I’m here to tell you…very. On top of eating rocoto relleno, we ate cake. There’s a popsicle company, Arica, that Javier likes. They sell their popsicles on the street out of little red carts. Well, in Arequipa, there’s an Artica store, that sells not only popsicles, and the famous queso helado (cheese ice cream) but so much more, including…tres leches cake. Now, we’ve both had our fair share of tres leches, and this one took the cake 🙂 We ate cake, Every. Single. Day.
Arequipa, Peru.
We took a free walking tour- in Spanish. The English tour was HUGE, and I figured…why not?? It was a good experience and ended in pisco shots. We walked around the plaza, and visited the Monasterio Santa Catalina, where we both learned something. We were always under the impression that monasteries were for men and convents were for women. Not so. According to our guide, a monastery can be either men or women and so can a convent. The difference is that the inhabitants of a monastery are completely isolated from the outside world, while in a convent, the inhabitants can come and go as they please. This Monastery was for women only. Most of the walls are brightly painted either brick red or ocean blue. There are flowers everywhere, fountains, and stone streets. It is truly a little community in there- very peaceful. Today, there are still nuns who live there, but they are in a very small portion of the monastery- still cut off from the outside world.
Blackout candle light. Arequipa, Peru.
Arequipa has a famous mountain- Misti, which Javier was finally able to take a picture of from the roof of our hotel thanks to a break in the clouds.
We had intended to meet with one of Javier’s friends while in Arequipa. We set a time, and when Javier and I arrived to the plaza, everything was dark. There was a power outage, including the restaurant where we were planning on eating. We went back to the hotel to send a message. She said it was fortuitous since her baby had just gone down to sleep and it was raining. No problem. There was a place we wanted to try earlier, so Javier and I had a romantic candlelight dinner of sandwiches. 🙂 We did get to meet with another one of Javier’s friends. Beto, as his friend’s call him, moved from Cusco and was in the process of opening a bar. We decided to visit him at his bar and watch some soccer. We opened a bottle of pisco, courtesy of our friend Jose Zarate, watched the game, and visited with one another. It was a very pleasant afternoon.
Arequipa cathedral devil pulpit.
We wanted to see the the inside of the cathedral- specifically, the devil pulpit. Yes, there is a devil with horns and a snake tail carved into the base of the wooden pulpit. This cathedral also houses the largest organ in South America, a gift from the Belgians. We didn’t get to hear the organ, but I’m sure it sounds very organ-y. Before leaving Arequipa, we stopped by a church to take a picture of a creepy Jesus that we saw during our tour, but didn’t have time to capture. Other than that, some more cake and a sandwich to-go; that sums up our visit to Arequipa.
To see more pictures of Santiago de Atacama and Arequipa, click HERE.