Up to my Ying Yangs in Bahia Iglesa

It was becoming apparent I was the only tourist in town. Breakfast (a welcome return after the previous hotel) was served in the dining room......... for 1. It is a fun building but I can't help wondering why they built it like that here.

I wandered along the beach and had it all to myself. There were a few die hard handicraft pitches, a lot of them were actually making the things which is nice to see. I can only assume they heard there was a Gringo in town.
It is a lovely bay with some fishing boats toiling away with crustaceans rather than fish.

As with most South American towns, dogs run around in small packs barking at cars and chasing motorbikes! They happily gamble along the beach with you. One in particular was very friendly and kept dropping his ball for me to throw. Well once I had thrown it, that was it. He was my best mate!

 

It is odd to have the ocean, the beach and the desert all next to each other. Where does the beach end and the desert start? From the tracks in the sand the locals obviously like to bring the 4X4's along the beach for BBQ's, launch boats and general mucking about in the sand.

 

I asked at the hotel if it was ok to take the bike on the sand. Si! So I took all the luggage off and drove down on to the beach. Where the trucks had been it was nice and compact and rather easy blasting along.

I know that there will be some sandy tracks later in my trip - getting in to Bolivia for a start, so it was a good time to practice the deeper stuff..................about 10 meters later I was up to my Ying Yangs in sand, stuck good and proper!

I learnt several important lessons;
The bike doesn't need a stand when this deep in sand
You can build up a sweat quite quickly
You look over your shoulder often to see if anyone is watching you make an arse of yourself

Actually I did want to practice getting out of sand and it is good to know for later on. You have to tip the bike over on it's side, fill in the hole you have just made with stones. Then stand the bike upright again (another confidence booster - you can actually pick up this leviathan!). Then drive the bike out as you walk along side until you reach some firmer sand..

Top Tip - do a really good job with the stones once, rather than try to get away with a few tiddlers. They don't work and you end up doing it about four times when once properly would be much less effort and sweat!

The great thing is that no one else was on the beach during the whole episode. I quickly rode back to the hotel and put the panniers back on! Whilst doing this a chap came up to look at the bike, that and the beads of sweat pouring off of me! He was a pilot and had just flown in from El Salvador with one of Chile's copper magnates in for a lunch meeting. He was kicking his heels for a few hours before taking his man off to Santiago for dinner. He knew all about the Antartica flights as he had done these in the past.

It was an early dinner as I wanted to get an early start the next day as it was a long haul through more desert to Antofagsta.