Tuesday 2nd February
I arrived here from Arica (4 hours trip, 325 km) ... had planned to stay for 2 nights but ended up staying till Sunday! I cant say enough good things about Iquique but as I write this blog I´m trying to think back what I actually done for my 6 days in Iquique and all I can remember is steak dinners, niteclubbing, so many new friends and lazy days on the beach. I´m so happy I came to Iquique and even as I write this I want to go back!
Iquique is just what I needed after spending the last few weeks travelling from town to town in Chile and not really meeting up with any backpackers. Iquique is full of them ... well at least my hostel was. I checked into HI Backpackers Hostel Iquique on Tuesday afternoon and was sharing a 6 bed dorm with some English, Australians and Chilean. The hostel is pretty big and probably has room for about 50 or 60 backpackers.
http://www.hosteliquique.cl/english.html
My room and some views from the hostel:
Its probably easier if I give an overview of my 6 days rather than a day by day account. The hostel is located right across the road from the beach so suffice to say I crawled out of bed in the morning and made my way over to the beach to sunbathe for the day.
This was literally how I spent every afternoon in Iquique .. me and a crowd from the hostel on the beach and in the sea (Iquique has really big waves .. but so many jellyfish)! It was really good .. even if you made you way over to the beach in the afternoon on your own, there was always a group from the hostel there and everybody just seemed to join up in one big group. Was really good for any solo travellers.
The hostel had BBQ`s on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday and the food was super.
Lovely steak and salad and red wine. BBQ nights are always great for meeting new people, and usually after the BBQ everyone hung out at the hostel having a few beers and then onto a niteclub about 1am.
I really cannot possible mention all the great people I met at this hostel but here are a few pics from BBQ nights and of some of the people who made Iquique great for me:
On Thursday I decided I better get away from the beach and take a look around the town centre (even if it was for only one hour or so).
I had planned to travel back up to Arica as I heard there was a folk and dance festival on at the weekend but apparantly I got my dates wrong as it was for the following week. As it turned out there was a folk and dance festival on in Iquique Thursday - Saturday. On Friday myself and some friends from France and Australia (Paul and Kerryn) made our way downtown to check it out. We saw some traditional folk music and dancing from different countries in South America. Was nice to see it but it wasnt exactly a festival .. more of a stage in the town centre and people gathered around to watch it.
Sunday 6th February
A very hectic Saturday night meant that I was really tired on Sunday and I also had to check out early. Spent the afternoon on the beach (as usual) and got a lovely Chinese takeaway (which was almost as good as Chinatown in Lucan!). Got my overnight bus at 23:55 to San Pedro de Atatcama (c.480kms, 13,000 CHP, 9 hours incl the layover in Calama as I had to change bus).
Very sad to leave Iquique :-(
Hi Peter,
ReplyDeleteYou got us worried there for a while, keeping quiet for 3 weeks and all. You know how dangerous it's there: one keeps hearing stories about space aliens abducting people, just to return them to their bed the next morning in unexpected company, with erased memory and gigantic hangover. They plant empty bottles around the victims as decoys. Very clever, I must say.
Anyway. Sheer awesomeness.
I'm only worried with the clouds missing from the picture. Don't you have agoraphobia of some sort? I'd be afraid that the sky will fall on my head or something. Nothing like the good old evenly spread gray Dublin sky you could slice with a knife if you stand on your toes. Miss home already?
So I decided to refuse to vote (not that I'm eligible, but it's a *statement* to all them politicians out there) should they refuse to make such holiday compulsory for everyone. Not that it'll make any difference, so relax, Ireland will still be here by the time you're back.
Maya says hi.
Enjoy while it lasts. ;)
Michael