Easy day's drive

10 Aug Had to turn the heat on this morning to take the chill off inside. It was nice knowing we had a full tank of propane at our disposal. Hot water was also heated last night for our shower, which is only the third time all trip we've needed to heat the water. We only saw a little neblina this morning, maybe 45 minutes, and then the fog lifted up enough to be off the roadway. The drive to the border was easy for Roger, with only short periods of rough road. Looking at the map, I was afraid we were going to have several winding mountain climbs, but in reality it was just climbing up to the pampas, or climbing down to them. We finally found an area in Peru that didn't have a lot of trash alongside of the road. There were several changes in the color of sand, from light brown, to dark brown, to reddish orange. Then there were huts out in the middle of nowhere that made the drive very different. At the Peru border, we parked went to some guys standing outside the building to get a form and filled out his log. Next, we went inside to get our passports stamped for departure. I was organized and easily found the 2x3 form that we received when we entered the country, that also had to be turned in. After getting our passports stamped we left the building and turn the corner to the left and went inside to get the paperwork for the RV. The guy came outside and viewed our RV (from right outside his office to where our RV was parked in the Auto section, not with the trucks or buses). He stamped our paperwork and we left. At the Chile border, we parked over to the right and walked inside to get our passports stamped and filled out a form that was stamped and returned to us and will be collected upon our departure from Chile. Next we were told to drive the RV up to the inspection lanes. (All the cars had to be emptied of all luggage and the luggage x-rayed.) PDI ran the drug dog through the inside of our RV and outside it. Next I was given a vehicle form and told to fill it out. Roger had to go with a guy to go get the RV X-rayed, since we couldn't empty the entire contents for small security x-ray. Roger writes: The whole-vehicle x-ray was a new experience. They have a Chinese-made truck with a huge x-ray scanner that drives slowly past the length of our RV with an upside-down U passing over and down both sides of the rv. Very unusual to watch. It identified three areas they wanted to visually inspect; one was a plastic box with a six-pack of Clorox wet wipes; second was all the kitchen appliance gadgetry under the sink in the kitchen; and third was the fresh water tank "hidden" (read 'installed') located under the bed. I happily opened up compartments, the slide-out, under the bed, etc. I think they were curious about the design in general as it is not something they see with any frequency. What little vehicle camping there is here is truck campers and some small "VW Vanagon" camping vans. We have not seen any camping trailers. In fact, trailers other than semi-trailers are very rare. The whole process of immigration/emigration, customs exit/entry, and vehicle x-ray inspection took about an hour and a half. Border traffic was quite light. Driving is a completely different experience during our first day in Chile. 1) People drive somewhere close to the speed limit; 2) Drivers YIELD to pedestrians, 3) Drivers are courteous, with only one car in each lane, instead of up to three; 4) Drivers adhere to traffic lights/signs; and 5) Drivers to not drive with one hand constantly on the horn, beeping at everyone and thing they see. I LIKE CHILE ALREADY and I haven't seen hardly any of it. We walked to a "Lider" store in Arica Chile to restock food supplies. Lider is Walmart's brand store in Chile (think price 'leader'). It was very busy and there were lots of shelves that had empty spaces. It's always a challenge to go to a crowded store that you're unfamiliar with. Glad we walked, as parking for our size vehicle was non-existent. Afterwards we left with the RV to go buy water to fill the tank. Water came in a container larger than a 5 gal jug, and we needed 6 costing us about $21. Filling the tank with jugs requires two people, a ladder and a funnel. I climb the ladder with the jug, while Trinora holds the funnel and tries not to get wet with the pouring water. Most of the time we've been able to get free water, but occasionally we just can't find it. We both like to have fresh water in the tank, and empty black and grey water tanks.