Friday's destination was the “driest city in the world”, Arica, Chile. Annual rainfall here is .03” (.76 mm) thanks to the city’s proximity to the Altacama Desert. It’s believed that there are parts of this wilderness that have never received a drop of rain, as well as places that have no life, not even on a cellular level.
We arrived in port later than we usually do, not until about 10:30 a.m. It was interesting to watch as the ship backed into position on the dock. This was my first view towards the south.
Up on top of Serenade I got a view towards the city of Arica itself with those desolate hills in the background.
The landmark hill, El Morro, is the most easily recognizable feature of the city. At 427 ft (130 m) it has a walkway that starts at Colón Street that will take you to the top of this national monument. Lucky for us our tour bus took us to the top rather than having to make the hike. This spot was the site of the last Peruvian stronghold against the Chileans at the end of the War of the Pacific between Chile and a Peru/Bolivia alliance over borders and nitrate mining. The battle here was the site of much bloodshed.
Definitely must be some fishing that goes on in the port as well but I think the boats were in port this morning for the city festival. More on that later. Geographically we are in a spot called the Arica Bend, or Arica Elbow, where the strictly western coast of South America ends and the continent begins to bend out towards the north and west. It’s also Chile’s northernmost seaport, only 11 mi (18 km) from the Peruvian border. The city was founded in 1541 on the site of a pre-Columbian settlement and was originally called Villa de San Marcos de Arica. It was a major port during the time of Spanish colonial rule, being the primary export point during the 16th and 17th centuries for the largest silver mine in the Spanish Empire, along with other products from the interior.
Thanks to the lack of rainfall here pretty much all the new construction around town have flat roofs, easier to build and why bother with peaks when you don't need them. As we drove around I had to keep wondering what it would be like to live in a place without rain, especially when one of my favorite things is a good rainstorm.
At the top of El Morro I got a nice view of Serenade, not that far below, although it looks like I was taking the photo from the moon.
What is now a peninsula used to be Alacrán (Scorpion) Island. The connection was added in 1964. Formerly a Spanish fort stood on the island, plus it was also known as a place for gathering shellfish and guano, hopefully not at the same time. These days it's known as a starting point for various water sports.
Atop the El Morro is the Cristo de la Paz, or Christ of Peace, a symbol of peace and harmony between Chile and Peru. It was brought to the country from Spain in 1987 and placed in nearby Fort Azapa, then placed in its current location in November of 1999.
I've always known about rip tides and strong currents, but this visual of waves breaking every which way was a great visual. There are only three beaches in Arica that are safe for swimming, this spot isn't one of them.
On the other hand this protected cove is the perfect beach location and there were plenty of nearby condos to fill it up on a weekend. Later as we drove by this area you could see tents all along a stretch of beach just south of here. Isaac, our guide, told us the locals like to just set them up, bring in rugs and whatever they needed from home and set themselves up for a couple of weeks of vacation.
Karl went one way with the 360 camera and I went another to take stills, had to take a selfie to prove that I was there.
This huge Chilean flag sits atop El Morro, there is only one other in the country that is as large as this one. It's quite reminiscent of the Texas flag so don't get confused!
I kept hearing music at the top of the hill but it took me a while to figure out where it was coming from. Even with all my research previous to the trip I had no idea that the day we were in Arica was part of their biggest festival of the year. There were thousands playing in bands plus dancers from all over the region, in this multicultural extravaganza. I loved what we did but I would also have loved to have spent the day watching the dancers. A few pictures of them coming at the end of the post.
One of the unexpected features of Arica is the church above. I had hoped to get closer photos but the crowds were just too much after we got back from our tour so I had to be satisfied with these. What makes it unique is that the San Marcos de Arica Church, completed in 1876 to replace the previous cathedral that had been destroyed by an earthquake in 1868, was one of the first structures designed by none other than Gustav Eiffel and his company, eleven years before his more famous tower in Paris. Arica has one other building designed by Eiffel as well, the Old Custom House. Both structures were prefabricated in France, shipped to Chile and constructed on site.
Always good to see some soccer wherever we go, I'm in withdrawal from watching!
With later port arrival one of the first parts of the tour was lunch, which was unusual since it's often at the end. The owner of Isadora was so happy to have our three groups of fourteen there and welcomed us all in Spanish with the guides acting as translators.
I added this photo for the little sign on the lower right. All the ports on the Chilean coast have been places that are earthquake prone so there are always evacuation route signs about, often for tsunamis.
Napkins have been pretty small all throughout Chile, this one almost seemed to be two sheets of toilet paper!
Lunch was tasty, with side dishes that were different than the typical rice. Karl had beef shortribs and I had fish, each came with quinoa, Karl said "What is this I'm eating?", cucumber, little onion rings, cherry tomatoes and some of the olives that are famous in the region. It all looked so nice on the plate.
Karl had the flan for dessert and I was going to have cheesecake. However, after I got the last piece I heard one of our friends say she couldn't eat the other options so I handed mine off to her and got the "rice pudding". I know, it looks like I was eating a cob of corn! I'm assuming they had some sort of mold to make this dish and if it was a rice pudding they had pureed it before freezing it. I'm not exactly sure what it was in the middle that was raspberry colored. It was a tasty dessert, different and fun as well.
Our next stop was unexpected for me, the city's massive farmer's market, the Asoagro Market.
The moment we walked in, I saw all the colorful stalls full of all kinds of produce and smelled the sweet scents of untold fruits. I knew this was going to be a great place to explore.
I have to wonder if people like to come here just to get a break from the dreariness of their surroundings. It would certainly lift my spirits. The hardest part of being there was knowing that we couldn't take any of the fresh produce back with us, although Karl and Steve both bought bags of those beautiful cherries on the lower left to share with everyone on the bus. Oh were they sweet and delicious and only about 50 cents a pound! And yes, we took a chance with our intestinal health eating cherries that we couldn't wash but after over 24 hours we haven't had any ill effects!
This Socoroma oregano is something that the Aricaños love to cook with. Isaac asked this lovely vendor if we could smell a bit of it. She got some out of the bin and put it in his hand, then he gave us a bit to rub so we'd get the scent. It was so nice! As we went to leave this sweet woman gave me a bag of oregano and wouldn't let me pay for it, she wanted to give it as a gift. Her generosity was one of the best moments of the day.
Karl loved wandering around here as much as I did. We couldn't help but wonder what happens to all the produce that doesn't get purchased, there were aisles and aisles of these beautiful fruits and vegetables. Isaac said that everyone comes here to shop and I can see why they would.
Interesting way to sell the olives that are grown here. Each barrel had a different type of olive marinating inside. I would have liked to try them all.
When we walked down the flower aisle these pretty arrangements caught my eye, for $1 each I would have bought half a dozen. And while these prices seem so cheap to me I had to remember that annual income here is very low and these would have been a splurge.
Okay, one last produce picture I took as we were leaving, potatoes. We've grown reds, purples, russets, and golden ones but I've never seen any that looked pink and yellow like the ones in the bag in front. I would really have liked to try some of those! Karl wanted to note that the stuff in the bags in front of the potatoes are coca leaves.
Next stop was to view the geoglyphs on the hillside something Arica is famous for. There were two different sets of them at this location.
Geoglyphs are made by adding or removing rock to make a picture or design on the side of a mountain. They can be of people or animals. These are along what used to be a major trade route that llamas would travel so these may have been a sort of map, no one really knows.
This glyph is the llama herder, although I'm not sure why he is facing away from the llamas themselves. I have to admit I was pretty pleased with the zoom on my phone's camera.
Just a glimpse of the Azapa Valley where the greens ran along the bottom while the dirt and rock rose above. It just proved how fertile it could be if there was water. The moisture here comes mostly from "rivers" that run underground, although we never saw any evidence of wells.
The earliest people to live in this area were the Chinchorro. We stopped next at the Archeological Museum of San Miguel of Azapa where the highlights are four Chinchorro mummies, some of the world’s oldest. Pictures of them coming soon. The holes in the rock above were made as the people ground grains, mostly corn, against the stone. Isaac told me the story of how others think that this particular stone might have been one that would have had the holes filled with water so that the stars would reflect in them at night, bringing that evening sky closer to the people here on earth.
The Chinchorro would also carve pictoglyphs into the rocks around them, these are a couple of examples.
Although they look like a bunch of chairs, each of these rocks is another grinding stone, collected and displayed outdoors at the museum.
None of the Chinchorro were very tall, only around 4'-5' in height, and if you made it to the age of 25 you were old. Life was hard. The examples above are some of the small bits of clothing that they wore, but as you might guess, in a place like the Azapa Valley, where it was "eternal spring", they didn't need to wear much.
The Chinchorro people lived in the extremes of the coastal desert from 5450 BC to 890 BC and were the first people to mummify their dead. Move over Egyptians! Here are some of the famous mummies.
Actually, the Chinchorro way of preserving bodies was different from the Egyptians so technically it wasn't mummification, the dryness of the desert helped do that. The body above would have been from the era of "black" or "negro" mummies where they would make incisions to remove all the organs, and the brain, also the skin, then stuff the bones with mud, feathers and manganese powder. They also liked to sniff that latter which may have contributed to the reason they lived less than 25 years.
Also unlike the Egyptians, the Chincorro didn't bury their dead, they just took them along with them wherever they went, keeping the bodies in their homes. Because they were a part of the decor they liked to make the mummies look nice, as a sign of respect and also because they had to keep looking at them.
This mummy is from a later era when they removed all the internal organs but not the skin. Later they just began wrapping them in cloth bandages and then covering those with mud, just like with things today their processes changed over time.
Taking a break from what one of our younger friends called the "creepy" mummies, we explored a little outside between the two museum buildings. I always love verbena.
Karl found a fig tree and decided to strike a pose!
Gorgeous red hibiscus.
In the museum you can learn about 10,000 years of human development as you peruse the 20,000 archaeological pieces that include, among other things, jewelry, weapons and tools. I felt like this display of planting potatoes wasn't that much different than the way we plant ours in our garden.
Just a few ancient accessories. These people were talented and creative.
A collection of flutes here, still a significant part of Chilean music. The "hat" up behind them is a puma, a headdress that would have been worn by the local shaman as pumas were considered sacred. It would have to have been brought from the Andes.
Some pretty pottery and a hat. The four "ears" on the latter have no special significance that Isaac knew about.
Sorry about the glare but wanted to add this one last artifact. It's called a Quipo and the knots on it were used for counting and accounting.
It was interesting to see how the fields were often covered with fabric sunscreens, the same color as the hills themselves. We had to assume they were needed to keep crops from getting sunburned because as Isaac said the city of "eternal spring" is turning into the city of "eternal summer".
This lovely little church is the Templo de San Jeronimo de Poconchile. It's one of the oldest in the area, very simple but beautiful in its own way., constructed in 1605. The cemetery behind it is even older.
This simple altar was the only decoration inside, including the beautiful carving which was probably added later. They are working on having the church become a protected site.
The people who lived here when the Spaniards came were the Aymara. Conquistadors were bent on destroying local culture and imposing their own on the people. The way that the Aymara were able to keep some of theirs was by learning to worship in their own way and see their own culture in Catholicism. For example, for this opening in the ceiling of the church, rather than seeing it as a way to let God into the church the Aymara would see the sun coming in. In that way they would see their god, Tata-inti, coming in to protect them. In these kinds of ways they were able to protect their culture and hide their beliefs during colonization. For me, I just liked the lovely painting of Jesus.
Yep, this is some pretty desolate terrain. I'm pretty confident I would not like living in the Altacama Desert.
Our final stop of the day was in the Lluta (joo-tah) Valley where we were able to get a glimpse of some more geoglyphs. The above looked like some kind of animal to me but not as recognizable as the llamas we'd seen earlier.
These two figures were called the Lluta Giants, they were pretty enormous. Again, my zoom did a pretty good job.
The other interesting things to see at this stop were these storage containers in the ground called colcas. Apparently they were used by the Incas to deposit food and other commodities that they might need later.
Petrified corn cobs and husks have been found on site as well as bits of Incan pottery. They can date it to that period due to the geometric patterns on the clay, prior to the Inca culture designs would have been animals or people.
Karl thought this container would have done the best at keeping things cooler thanks to the larger rocks that lined the bottom. These pits were all about 3-4 feet deep. Salt was another item they would often store there.
Driving back there were lots of these types of "structures", some were businesses and others might have been living quarters.
One more of the roadside buildings shot through the really dirty window of the bus, which by the way did not have air conditioning that worked. Our guide was very apologetic, he assured us it had worked when they picked up the mini-bus. We were in the very back with just a smidge of legroom for me. Thankfully the window next to me would stay open a crack so as long as we were moving I had a pretty good breeze going. It was all just part of the adventure.
When we arrived back at port the cultural festival was across the street and still going on in full swing. There were costumed dancers everywhere. So many of them were so colorful.
I just snapped whatever pictures I could of various costumes as they walked by, or as I saw them across the street. We thought about going over to the festival for a little bit but we were both tired enough from our long and warm day that we were ready to get back to the ship and some air conditioning. Yep, we're wimps...kinda.
This cute little boy was all dressed up in this costume and just dancing around on the sidewalk. I asked the adults with him if if would be okay if I took a picture. They were kind enough to let me. Doesn't he look scary but cute?
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