Latinalicious: The South America Diaries (28 page)

Poor Eduardo, we thought, as The Crab steered the car over the rocky salt flats back towards San Pedro. Our fabulous Chilean guide had been pointing out the natural habitat of a pretty pink flamingo when he tripped over a concrete bollard in the viewing area and dislocated his shoulder, so instead of learning more about the harsh desert environment, we were speeding through it on the way to the hospital. Poor, poor Eduardo.

After working our way down from Cuzco, back to Arequipa and into Chile’s northernmost city, Arica, The Crab and I had headed south via Iquique – a really pretty coastal spot (although the sea was way too cold for swimming) – to spend a few amazing days in beautiful Valparaiso. Imagine a city by the sea that looks as if first a rainbow was splashed all over it, then a crack team of graffiti artists armed with spray cans hit it. Valparaiso is crazy cool and expensive.

After dining there on some of the most ludicrously priced food and wine I’d had in South America, we’d found ourselves in the harsh, cowboy town of San Pedro in the Atacama Desert, where we’d taken Eduardo up on his offer of a tour – and that didn’t end well, obviously. After depositing him in the emergency ward we headed back to the Aatacamadventure Wellness & Ecolodge, a sandy, windswept resort consisting of a few rooms and a hot tub in the middle of nowhere. This place offers quite possibly the most rustic desert experience you could ask for outside of living in a Bedouin tent and plodding around on a camel.

We also stayed a few ‘romantic’ nights at the ridiculously chic Alto Atacama Desert Lodge & Spa, which spoilt us rotten; something The Crab and I felt we deserved after time spent in a hideous granny flat back in Arica, which was so much worse than anywhere else I’ve ever stayed I’m struggling to describe it. We couldn’t even get into that place without ringing a bell and waiting ten minutes for a decrepit old woman to hobble down the stairs and open the door.

Perhaps we should have booked somewhere in advance in Arica, but The Crab and I have kind of been winging this whole thing, and we’re not the best-organised people, we’re discovering. I think travelling alone makes me get off my arse and get things sorted but when you have a travel buddy somehow it’s easier to leave more to chance. Sometimes that can be amazing: you can have such unprecedented adventures, like the time we smoked some local produce (ahem) with a guy we met on a beach in Arica and ended up first in a skateboarding park attempting Spanish with his teenage friends, then back in the dreaded granny flat talking to dead people. (Don’t ask.) But most times you really should prepare.

I’ve been travelling with The Crab for a few weeks now, but I have to say nothing tests a friendship like spending twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week with someone. He’s become my best friend, husband, wingman, sidekick, all in one go with no room for ‘gradually getting to know each other’ whatsoever, but that’s travelling, I guess. It’s all or nothing on the road when you team up. You’re going to see each other at your best and worst, when you’re hungover, sick to the stomach, sunburnt and grouchy … but to compensate, you’re going to have the time of your goddamn life and you’re never going to forget any of the eye-opening things you’ll witness together.

I thought the stars in the Galapagos were incredible, but the Atacama Desert is known for being one of the best places for stargazing in the world and it didn’t disappoint. A trip to the observatory the other night had us standing inside a huge glass dome, which moved around us like some kind of space pod, allowing us to see the craters on the moon in such close up clarity it felt as if I could touch them.

I’ve never actually travelled with a guy before, but we get along surprisingly well. I guess we wouldn’t keep going if we didn’t. Plus it’s really great to be stargazing and desert trekking with someone of the male species. Not only do I have someone who can appreciate the wonders of the world with me, but he can also help carry my bags, ward off creepy local men, apply sunscreen to my back and keep me on the ball when it comes to shaving my legs.

We still have two more months to go, as we’re planning to carry on to Santiago and then back to southeast Asia to see some of Thailand, Vietnam, Bali (The Crab has never been) and Japan. Who knows what the future holds after that, but I guess the point of this epilogue is to show that the journey never ends; it just goes on as you bust more doors down and open yourself up to opportunities. I never thought I’d end this South American trip by travelling even further with an American guy, but then a year ago I never thought I’d be in South America at all.

Actually, the more I hear about the US from The Crab, the more I want to go back there. I lived there once, from 2001 to 2003, and I never quite got it out of my system. If we’re supposed to meet people for a reason, perhaps one of the reasons I met The Crab was to kick-start another process; to take me back to where it all began; to where I first started believing in lands of opportunity?

We are changing each other day by day, second by second and, even when it seems like there isn’t a plan, things are falling into place, just as if everything was planned all along.

For now, though, being in the moment is all that matters. I’m just going to enjoy looking up at the stars some more, and wishing on one or two that Eduardo’s OK in his hospital bed.

Aww.

Poor Eduardo.

Becky Wicks is the author of two previous humorous travel memoirs,
Burqalicious: The Dubai Diaries
and
Balilicious: The Bali Diaries
. She’s been gallivanting around the world since graduating Lincoln Uni in 2001 and has lived and worked in London, New York, Dubai, Sydney and Indonesia. To earn a living she’s sold her soul to the advertising industry, written credit card copy for banks that wouldn’t give her a credit card, been a morning radio show sidekick and sold jello shots in Manhattan. She’s currently Bali-based, where she’s freelancing, working on fiction, and awaiting the next adventure. Becky blogs most days on travel and random ridiculousness at
www.beckywicks.com
. Twitter: bex_wicks

HarperCollins
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First published in Australia in 2013

This edition published in 2013

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Copyright © Rebecca Wicks 2013

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National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Wicks, Rebecca.

Latinalicious : the South America diaries / Becky Wicks.

ISBN: 978 0 7322 9641 4 (pbk.)

ISBN: 978 1 7430 9829 5 (epub)

Wicks, Rebecca – Anecdotes.

Women travelers – South America – Description and travel.

910.4

Photographs by Rebecca Wicks

Cover and internal design by Natalie Winter

Map by
www.ianfaulknerillustrator.com