Feb. 14/15 – Chile
Monday, February 27th, 2006Day 197/198 – Yesterday we left Valparaiso and took a bus south to San Antonio. We timed it so we could be at the port office first thing in the morning, to start the process of retrieving the car. San Antonio is an interesting port town, with a mix of local tourists coming in for day trips from all of the neighboring beach resorts. The town is filled, to a vacationer’s delight, with little shops and stands selling souvenirs, churros, and empanadas along the modern boardwalk. At the entrance of the boardwalk, off the town square, is a small carnival with a few rides for children and tons of vendors selling more churros, chocolate covered fruit & marshmallows, candied apples, cotton candy, and empanadas. Since it was Valentines Day we splurged and bought a small bag of churros, a stick of chocolate covered strawberries, and chocolate covered marshmallows on a stick; I think that topped off our sweet tooth cravings for a week! It was a great night consisting of people watching, hanging out on the boardwalk, and looking out into the port, wondering which ship was named Clan Tribune. That is the ship our van, Henry, is on.
San Antonio boardwalk
the port
The ship
After being woken up by a fly, after it briefly landed on my face (which was quite strange, since our alarm clock broke and I was hoping my body would wake me automatically at 7.00am; instead a fly helped me) we made our way to the port office and got there right before the doors opened. We waited in the company’s lounge chairs for the appropriate person to come into the office and confirm two things: that the ship was in, and that we would be able to get our container in the afternoon. Along with that news was the shock of an extra fee we had to pay for retrieving the car from the ship. It was much more than Jason was quoted back in Costa Rica; costing $14,050 pesos (about $266USD). The company originally told Jason it would cost a maximum of $20USD. Though the company was extremely nice; they took care of all the paperwork for us at customs, arranged everything to get the car out of the container, and drove us around to finalize the paperwork. After the paperwork, while we were waiting for the van, we wandered the streets, ending up in a smaller town named Llolleo, which is south of the port. There we enjoyed the town square while children rode pedal cars around and vendors sold second hand books.
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waiting for the van… and here it is!!!
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unleash the lion….
It was 4.00 when we finally got the car permit signed. The car rolled out of the container with no problems, except a bit of extra noise from stiff joints that had not moved for the past 15 days. All the workers were extremely interested in the vehicle, and its little components that make it a camper van, or Kombi, as it is called everywhere else in the world. Jason received a liter of Coke from one of the port workers, as a gift to start out our road trip. After two inspections and a thumbs up for cleanliness (we thoroughly cleaned the van before it entered the container) we hit the road, with some help from the gentleman that did all of our paperwork; he led us to the highway entrance. I was relieved and felt whole again, being back in our van, rolling through the countryside. We are heading for the Andes!
on the road again
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