Iquique

Had a brilliant time in Iquique and ended up staying 11 days there. Had my own room in the paragliding hostel Altazor Flight Park so it was a nice chance to relax and set up a base for a while. The Iquique routine goes something like this:

1. Get up around 9, breakfast, then head up to Alto Hospicio (the main take off up on the ridge overlooking Iquique). 
2. Fly for a few hours, cruising the ridge, practice some wing overs / spirals / acro (if that´s your thing).
3. Land on the beach in the city or on the dunes just behind the flight park.
4. Lunch, siesta
5. Around 4, head down to the big dunes at Palo Buque (20km south of Iquique).
6. Fly till its dark. (mini XCs along the ridge, sand skiing, playing near the dune, high fives,  practising manoevres, acro, its all possible when the wind blows at Palo Buque!) 
7. Eat, drink, sleep, repeat. 

Take off at Alto Hospicio

Beach landing

What they don't tell you about the sand dunes at Palo Buque is that it's not all sand! There are actually a lot of rocks about so whilst the flying is great it's definitely not great for your gear. A bit further away from the main takeoff there are some nice clear sandy patches, perfect for skiing along. The hard bit is staying down! Also, not ideal playing on the dunes with a pod harness!

Had a couple of nice XCs running along the ridge from Alto Hospicio and Palo Buque. Pretty easy flying but occasionally tricky when trying to get round some of the spurs, slightly into wind and pretty rough at times in the lee. I headed south from Alto Hospicio twice (about 10km I think) and was foiled both times  trying to get round the corner to Palo Buque, where a statue of the Virgin Mary marks the turn. The wind accelerates round the point and each time I was stopped dead in my tracks and thrown about before I turned around and high tailed it outta there.

Had a lovely late evening XC from Palo Buque one night. Had been running around with local instructor Christian and pilots Milton and Ignacio for the first few days and after playing on the dune in a nice sandy spot for a while I had started to head back when I noticed they were both heading off into the distance. Knowing that Christian would be waiting with the van I chased after them and with full bar attempted to catch up. I was quite far behind and with the light fading had a few moments of self doubt when I lost site of them and considered the prospect of a long walk and a hitch hike home if I landed out alone. I did manage to catch them however and we turned back after about 20 km and got picked up half way back to the takeoff as night set in.

Palo Buque

After the first few days of that, I disrupted the routine a little by investing in some more spanish lessons; so for 4 days I practiced my spanish in the morning and then flew in the afternoons. Not a bad routine but the early starts were a killer!

Altazor Flight Park was a nice place to stay. Not quite the paragliding centre it used to be (the Swiss owner has had enough and its now run by a Chilean couple) but it still provides a great base for pilots. Had a mix of Chileans, Argentinians and a few Europeans staying there but it was pretty quiet for most of the time. Inevitably I mainly hung out with the Europeans as despite my extra lessons Chilean spanish remained as unintelligible as ever. A swiss couple (Marc and Nadia) and a french guy Mathieu were all there for a while, the 2 guys there to practice acro. 

Iquique had its own mini Coup Icare while we were there and we were invited to take part to raise money for the local club. Whilst my costume consisted merely of a clowns wig and sunglasses, there was a cracking line up of super heroes on display. 

That afternoon everyone went down to Palo Buque for more great flying and a party on the dune. Great bbq steaks and good tunes on the PA system, until the genny ran out of fuel...

The tops of the dunes at Palo Buque were pretty much always shrouded in cloud. We had one good sunny day which brought out the amazing colours of the dunes and was the only time I was able to climb up above the dunes to see the desert stretch out behind. Annoyingly, I unwittingly knocked the settings on my camera

so all my best shots have some funky effects applied.

 

My penultimate flight turned out to be a rather stressful affair. The weather wasn't great, pretty grey and with quite low cloud, but was flyable as ever at Alto Hospicio. Flew for an hour or so before noticing the wind on the sea was picking up so headed to the beach near the flight park to land. In the 10 mins it took me to reach the beach the wind had blown up into a fury and I found myself pinned above the beach, not going down and not going forwards. Hadn't realised before but there is a small ridge on the beach that with the strong wind was creating a lot of lift. Took me a good 20 mins and a lot of head scratching to eventually get down, which I thankfully did safely enough in the end. I was left in a slightly jittery state so delayed my planned departure that afternoon and once I'd regained some composure went for a last flight at Palo Buque.

Despite the strong wind in Iquique Palo Buque was pretty mellow. Smooth lift over the small dune and without much height which was just what I needed after my earlier flight!

Iquique itself is quite a nice beach city. The main street in the old town looks straight out a western, with wooden decking and colourful panelling. Alto Hospicio is a bit rougher, with a lot of the homeless living out on the cliff where the take off is. 

Iquique centre

Still determined to leave that day (as I'd already put it back a few times) I got a night bus back to San Pedro to then make my way into Bolivia via the salt flats.