Daytime came too early.
Both of us would have slept later if we could have but we knew Patricio
had said our new motorhome would be here at nine. We showered and dressed and
ate breakfast. At nine there was no sign
of him in the lobby so we had another cup of coffee. Afterwards Joan walked out in to the hotel
car park and saw a motorhome remarkably like the one that had broken down. Kevin switched on his phone and he had
messages from Patricio on WhatsApp to say the original motorhome had been fixed
and he was taking it for a test run to Vallenar overnight!!

We found Patricio and his colleague. They looked really tired and we weren’t too
sure where they had slept or if they had slept.
Patricio ran through the instructions for the electrics again and took
Kevin for a drive.

Eventually they headed back to Santiago and we headed
north. Our first port of call was a
petrol station where we bought two fuel cans.
In Chile the standard size is 20 litres.
We will need these if we want to go to the altiplano.

Once again we headed up Cuesta Buenos Aires to the Atacama
Desert. What was noticeable was that the
vehicle was no longer labouring on the hills. (It was awful when we first
picked it up.) The road to Copiapo is a dual carriageway and passes through an
arid landscape, dotted with signs for mines that have access roads that rise
improbably high to the top of hills.

We made good progress and finally started heading backdown
to the ocean. There were huge sand dunes
alongside the road.

Our guidebooks are now a bit old. We wanted to stay in Bahia Ingles – English
bay – which is famous in Chie for its white beaches, blue sea and jagged rock
formations. Our guidebook told of an
overpriced campsite overlooking Playa Las Machas. We couldn’t find it. Nervous about fuel levels, we decided to
drive to nearby (3km) Caldera to fill up with fuel before trying to look again. The campsite in the guide book was eventually
located. It was closed. Joan remembered seeing a billboard for
another campsite as we turned off the Ruta 5.
We went there and found an advert for Bahia Club camping. We drove back to the coast and Bahia Inglesa
but to no avail. We tried every street.
Then Joan remembered that Kevin had a phone with a Chilean SIM. Even better, Patricio had charged it with
credit! A quick Google and we realised
we had driven past the rear of the site. We found the front entrance, south of
the town on the beach and it was open.
Phew!!

We paid for a pitch and then walked in to Bahia Inglesa for
dinner along the beach. The resort is barely a village with a few hotels and
restaurants on the prom. We chose a
seafront bar and had a dinner of salad and chips. The manager had worked in England and asked
us where we came from. We said the countryside.
But he knew Southampton and Manchester.
We said our nearest city was Sheffield.
This did not seem to register. (Sorry, Sheffield City Region.)

A sad moment came when a chap tried to sell us something. We
had left food on our plates and he went to a bin to find a plastic bag to take
it. We gave him some money to buy food.

Then it was a walk back along the beach to our
campsite. The seafront here is being
remodelled and we took a short cut over the new promenade to avoid the
sand. Two security guards spotted us but
let us cross to get back to our motorhome.