Jan 23 Tacna to Ilo
From Tacna we take a small detour to the Northeast in order to see some petroglyphs. They found a very impressive collection of these ancient writing in the most unlikely spot, in what appears to be a dried up gulch.
Then it is back to our original plan of following the
coast up to Ilo, we figure that at least the coast line changes a bit and would
break up the repetitive desert scenery. The sight of green fields and
watermelon stands was a welcome sight, Brenda is a bit of a watermelon addict,
so we stop and purchase some fresh picked melon. The ladies are nice enough to
cut the red part off the peal and put it in a baggie for us, well not just for
us this is how they roll down here.
But first lunch. |
It was a nice treat and helped to keep us hydrated in the
desert heat. The coast is as expected, rolling hills with twisty pavement all
the way to Ilo. We only had one more stop before Ilo which was at another
SUNAT/Aduana checkpoint. They wanted to see the bike documents from the border,
at least they didn’t ask to search our luggage like they did for the bus behind
us. It appeared they intended to take all the cargo out of the bus and search
it all, lucky for us that the officer gave us back our paperwork and said we were
done.
After that it was smooth sailing into Ilo, but then the fun
started with finding a place that had parking. We ended up parking the bikes in
a “parkade” for the night, just no other options available. Once again things
work out the way they are supposed to, the “parkade” or as it is called here
Cochera, is also a motorcycle repair shop. Perfect, we can maybe get Brenda’s
skid plate fixed. The guy has a nice little shop set up but does not have an
aluminum welder, instead I settle for a couple of u-bolts and some rubber
spacers to rig up the skidplate the same as mine. It should not be a problem
for the rest of this trip, and we can get it repaired properly in Montevideo
over the summer. Well we will have to wait and see how that works out.
We now have to decide if we are heading back inland, which
means an increase in elevation and the very high possibility of rain, lots of
rain as it is the rainy season in the mountains. We have been in contact with
our Austrian buddies on the little Chinese bikes and some of their photos are
ridiculous. These ones are what the “highway” into La Paz looks like.
So as you can see it is much wetter than where we currently
are, but we will have to commit to it sooner or later as we can’t stay on the
coast forever, plus we miss the color green so much so that I bought a new
green shirt.