The rest of the bus trip I spent with my cd's trying to drown out the noise of the Chilean film, get annoyed about the pube- and goatee-less surfer kids in front of me and feeling increasingly dirty and smelly. Oh, I think I may have slept a little, too.

I thought of another thing that tells me I'm in Chile: mobile phones. The surfer kid family had about 5 between them (all except the five year old) and they kept getting calls, messages, playing with the ring tones etc.

We stopped at Charaña, where the girl next to me got off and a guy in a poison green shirt sat next to me. We stopped at Caldera, which seemed quite nice, before the Panamericana turns inland to Copiapo.

Copiapo, at first sight, was unassuming and remains so at second sight. I am at Residencial Nueva Chañarcillo, and the LP is bang on target describing it as 'kitsched out'. It's frighteningly green, with a warren of rooms, flower patterned sofas and frilly covers on the toilet seat. The owner makes Marge Simpson's chain smoking sisters sound like healthy teens and I could barely make out her form through the curtain of smoke in her little admin room.

I sat in the Plaza Prat (Peru has its Plaza de Armas, northern Chile Plaza Prat), which is very pleasant and shady, with lots of trees. The LP was also spot on about the fortune tellers, one nearly grabbed me when I got up to leave. I played the 'I am a dumb foreigner and I don't understand you' card, and then she left me alone.

I had lunch at Schop Dog, a hot dog. I haven't really eaten hot dogs for years, as I used them to survive when I was in (then) very expensive New York. I could have been in my own 'Supersize me' documentary. So I lost my taste for them a bit, until now. This one wasn't too good, but it really cracks me up how they come in special 'hot dog holders', to make them easier to eat.

Hm, very hot. Pavement melting hot in fact. Siesta time I think. I had a three hour nap and woke up slightly dazed and confused. I went into the supermarket, picked up my laundry and checked my emails. A guy jumped the queue again in the supermarket.It's that I don't know how to swear and get mad properly in Spanish or I would have done.