We are up and off early to catch the 10am bus back from Mendosa, Argentina, to Santiago, Chile. We expect the border crossing to be an improvement on the 2.5 hours. We are only just happy with the result. It is sunny and hot, 28 at the most. I packed a ham.cheese sandwich for the bus trip, don’t fancy any of the fast food on sale at bus terminal or stop at border. It is again a splendid trip over the Andes, up one valley to the ski areas and down another valley into the capital.
I eat my banana in the customs lineup. Fortunately as they confiscate my apple later, but the dogs are not interested in my ham/cheese sandwich for lunch! There are lots of Anglo tourists on this bus, English, Australian, American, no Canadians.
The scenery is spectacular and at the border we are in line with a group of bikers. I see a Canadian flag and meet the owner. He’s a guy from Vancouver island joining a group from WAshington state. They have shipped the bikes to Columbia and driving down the Panamerican highway to Ushawai? I check out the web site later. It is minimum US$30k to join them. I send a note to Cynthia (my biker neighbor). She is to interested.
It is only 1hr 15min at the border but we all stand by as one young lady is totally packed, all her undies on display then they take her into a backroom. But she emerges unscathed. OUr bags despatched back to the bus, we are lined up with our hand luggage and another unfortunate middle-aged hiker from UK has her peanuts confiscated. These Chilean customs are thorough! Later I find my bag of nuts and seeds in our food back...
WE are back into Santiago in the rush hour so it takes us about half an hour to do the last 2 blocks. Grabbing a taxi we are back to our lovely wee Intiwasi hotel, hot sweaty and tired and straight into the shower. A warm welcome back. Off to a nearby hotel resto for pizza pisco sour and gallons of water.
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