Inquique!

Well after a nice push through the coastal road made it to this free zone as they call it, it also happens to be a surf city.

It's very nice in parts and in others a slum, but I just tried to stick to the nice bits.

I was told that I would be able to find a zoom lens there so I took my chances at the free zone mall and sure enough I found one, a Nikor 70-300 mm which is very nice and also big and heavy not so nice but I had been meaning to get one so what the heck. 

At the mall I also found a solar recharger very good, need one.

Enjoyed the views of the surfers from my hotel room and refueled, the next day I packed up had a nice breakfast and took a few pictures of the surfers and some sort of parade.

It was then time to go after lunch, and trying to find the elusive chile patch, it was a lazy Sunday and did t head off until after two! Then all uphill! After 20 km of nonstop uphill I called it a day I was tired and the stop in Inquique was not very restful I need a few days of cool down I'll do so in Arica the last city in chile :( 

The sleeping spot tonight is not great in the desert with some sort of hard crust impossible to drive the pegs, and I broke the tent it's not bad but a pain, I have to fix the stitches on one of the pole tensioner a d the stove would not light, I got it going in the end, it does that from time to time, seems to work better in the morning...

Tomorrow is a big push for Arica!