Cross­ing The Andes

We got up at 4:45 am, cold and tired, hav­ing slept barely a few hours. We packed in the dark. I brushed my teeth quickly and decided to skip wash­ing my face with some expen­sive French prod­uct, for once. The water was freez­ing and of course, no hot water.

We got to the bus sta­tion sleepy and cranky. Once the “use of bus ter­mi­nal” fee paid, we had just enough boli­vianos for a bot­tle of water. We boarded the bus, still dark out­side, leav­ing La Paz behind us. Cross­ing the Andes, again, to Chile.

I was wear­ing pretty much all of my clothes: thick socks, pants, a tee shirt, a sweater, the jacket I bought in Perú (which, accord­ing to Feng, makes me look like a “biker chick”), and a scarf I bought in Bolivia. I put the sweater’s hood on and adjust my Ipod head­phones, in a des­per­ate attempt to block the noise from out­side. I must have looked like a moody teen.

The bus climbed in the moun­tains. La Paz is already almost 4,000 meters above sea level, and we were going higher. We passed through dirty sub­urbs, houses half destroyed or half built, dirt roads, peo­ple sleep­ing in the streets. The sun rose above the mountains.

We entered Bolivia’s high­lands, dry and dra­matic scenery. A few patches of grass here and there and miles and miles of flat land. In the back­ground, huge vol­ca­noes, above 6,000 meters high, their snowy peaks con­trast­ing with the crisp blue sky. Amaz­ing. Lamas, flamin­goes, vol­ca­noes, more flat land, and not a sin­gle vil­lage to be seen.

We reached the Boli­vian bor­der after a few hours and every­body got off the bus. We were under strict instruc­tion to not bring any drug (duh) and fruits and veg­gies to Chile, as the bus co-pilot repeated many times. “Noth­ing ani­mal or veg­e­tal”, he started yelling in the bus, a few kilo­me­ters before the bor­der. Every­body nod­ded, but sud­denly, many pas­sen­gers were open­ing their bags and dis­cov­er­ing mate de coca, coca leaves, weird leaves mix­tures etc. It took for­ever to clear them. We just waited in line, to get our exit stamp from Bolivia.

We drove a few more kilo­me­ters and reached the Chilean bor­der. What a scenery! The bor­der cross­ing is almost 5,000 meters above sea level, with moun­tains and vol­ca­noes in the back­ground. We left our back­packs with the police (searched for drugs), got our Chilean entry stamp, we back for the bags, X-ray, some more searches and finally we were able to go take pictures.

We were on top of the Andes… and now, we had to go down. Arica, our first stop in Chile, is an oasis in the mid­dle of the desert, close to the Pacific Ocean. It took over 6 hours to finally be a sea level, 6 hours of clos­ing our eyes as the dri­ver, prob­a­bly tired, was push­ing the bus to its lim­its, each time closer to the cliff. The road was extremely nar­row and we feared we would not make it.

Of course, we did. And sweaty, tired, and hun­gry, we arrived in Arica, our first Chilean city.

Two Vol­ca­noes

Dry Land At 4,800 Meters

Boli­vian Border

Arriv­ing In Chile

Vol­ca­noes And Snowy Peaks

Flamin­goes In The Lakes

Related arti­cles:

1. Arica, First Stop In Chile
2. Cross­ing To Uruguay
3. Perú To Bolivia
4. Costa Rica, Pacific Coast
5. Por La Car­retera — Arequipa