Still here in Calama



It has been a stressful week and a half for me here in Calama, I never know what is going on, I can't communicate adequately when it comes to my now much more complicated needs.  I can order food, buy stuff, get hotels, ask for directions, but when it comes to the complexities of international shipping arrangements for motos, I am perdito (lost).  I am still not sure what is going on, but at least the bike is packed and at the cargo terminal at the Calama airport.

I am being helped  by the 'jefe' of Hosteria Taira where I am staying.  He has been great, he has taken me to the local building supply outlet for crate materials and we used his truck to take the bike to airport, twice.

I had all the stuff packed into the bike crate except the engine and we took it to LAN carga.  Turned out that the bike crate was overweight by 20 kg, the limit is 170 kg, and it was 190.  I took some stuff out of the crate to bring it to 170 but they said that the cardboard cover of the steel frame crate had to be covered in wood.  So, back to Hosteria Taira to fix the crate and repack.  Back again to the airport with three boxes.  This time they accepted it, but I am still waiting for the paperwork. 

If all goes well the bike and I will meet in Santiago for the journey back to Canada. It has been a stressful week and a half.  Jefe is making all the arrangements and I don't really know what is going on because I can't understand him.  The dialect here is very difficult, I am using babel fish and my computer to translate, but even that is not working, he is using words that may come back translated as 'breadfruit' or not translated at all.  All in all it has been pretty frustrating, maybe today I will be outa here.

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