The road to Chile

Once again, I had an early start. This time it was to catch a 7:30AM bus from Arequipa to the Peruvian border town of Tacna. This went without a hitch -- the bus left pretty much right on time. We got to see several movies on the bus, including The Terminal, which I had not seen before (Spielberg directs Tom Hanks as a Bulgarian stuck in Newark Airport's no-man's-land). Also some silly surf movie, and another silly teen romantic comedy. Rah. The movies were a welcome respite from the landscape, which was basically piles of sand. Seriously. In the desert Southwest of America, there is life in the desert. The desert here looked like it was completely devoid of life.

Upon arrival in Tacna, the hucksterism for transport to Arica in Chile began the moment I got off the bus. I daresay it happened before I even got out the door.
I paid 18 soles (about $6) for a "collectivo" taxi to Arica. I should have haggled, but was sick and tired of haggling to save $1-1.50. There are buses that make the run, and there are these collectivos, which are mostly decommissioned US police cars (or their near twins). I highly recommend taking the collectivo, even though it costs more than the bus, since you clear border formalities more quickly. One traveler who had crossed this border took a bus, and it was delayed over 1 hour because some idiot had drugs, something neither side looks kindly on. My collection of 5 passengers went through Peruvian formalities fairly smoothly, but the young couple from Ecuador were stopped at the Chilean border (for reasons unknown to me, my Spanish isn't good enough to follow what the driver told the others), so we went on without them.

The entire drive, including border formalities, from Tacna to Arica took a little over 1 hour. This was aided by the driver, who drove really fast down the straight 2-to-4 lane road. How fast? Dunno, his speedo was broken.

I booked into a place recommended by my Rough Guide, but I don't like it, a bit of a dump, and they shut off the water at night (which didn't help when my traveler's disease resurfaced early this morning...)
  

Hasta luego!