Totoralillo

Last Saturday I ate a hurried lunch at home before hurrying to el centro. I was on a mission. Will, Maca, Lucas and I were going to the beach, which could only mean one thing: I needed a kite. During las Fiestras Patrias volantines are easy to find, but I had to ask  around in a couple of shops before finding one that carried kites.

I then headed to the bus terminal to meet up with the others. We waited for a bus to come that was headed the way we were going and hopped on. The bus ride was about forty-five minutes - 25 minutes to Coquimbo followed by 20 minutes watching the rugged coastline whiz past.

The bus dropped us off on the side of the highway and for over half an hour we walked down a windy road past the town of Totoralillo to the beach. The bad news: I discovered that my camera was basically out of batteries. (I took a grand total of 3 pictures on my camera during the trip.) Without further ado, I give you:

Totoralillo!

It was a perfect day for the beach. Paradoxically, there were amazing cloud banks covering the sky but it always seemed to be sunny.  I didn't swim, since the water was quite cold, but Lucas, Maca, and I convinced Will by offering him 1000, 500, and 500 CLP respectively (a total of ~four dollars!). He had to stay in the water for a full minute, fully submerged except for his head. Yikes.

There was a beautiful rocky hill abutting the beach, which tempted me no end. It wasn't very big so I scrambled up and within 10 minutes was enjoying the vista from the cima (top).  It was windy and I felt like this (minus all the pink and the leaves) :

I went back down to the beach and Will and I did some crossword puzzles (still addicted) before having a frisbee catch with Lucas. 

Soon enough I declared it to be kite time, so this time Will joined me and we clambered up the boulder-strewn hill with the volantín. The wind pattern kept blowing the kite into the side of the hill, which meant that we didn't have much success, but it was a lot of fun nonetheless.

(The next four photos are Will's, whose camera was functioning properly. He's a great photographer, as you can tell. Thanks, Will!)

I wanted to feel more like Pocahontas so I unbraided my hair.
Unsure why my expression is so pained.

After a few successes and many failures with the kite, we headed back down to the beach and packed our things up. The sun was setting, producing a beautiful array of colors in the sky and reflected in the water. Being on the Pacific is absolutely amazing - before coming to Chile I had never really experienced an ocean sunset before.  Though it's now a common sight for me, it hasn't lost any of its wonder for me.

My battery died again just when the sun dipped below the horizon.

It was about 8:15, and since it was a 45 minute walk back up to the highway we had to hurry to make sure we'd make the last bus that would pass by (at about 9pm). On the walk up, Lucas asked if we'd ever hitch-hiked (hacer el dedo). Will and I hadn't, but he and Maca had; it's a lot safer and more common in Chile.

With that in mind, we all stuck our thumbs out at the next car that passed by that might be able to fit all of us. An middle-aged man and his young son kindly picked us up, and with all four of us squished into the back seat he dropped us off at the highway. We knew we'd probably be waiting a while for the bus to come, so we decided to try hitchhiking again. We were lucky! Within five minutes Lucas was in the front of a pick-up with Maca, Will and I in the back, headed to Coquimbo. From Coquimbo, Will and I took a micro back to La Serena and were back in our homes by 10pm. An excellent day.

(The kite is furled in my room, waiting for its next beach expedition.)