We started off our day with some more yummy breakfast in the restaurant (complimentary buffet).  The hotel has a "kids club" thing that provides activities for the littler guests throughout the day.  We were actually leaving to head back to Tacna that morning, but we thought we could fit in some art time at 10am, since Henlie kind of wanted to do it the day before.  

We headed down to breakfast and then back upstairs to finish packing our things.  We headed over to the kids' area at 10am. Unfortunately, Chile seems almost as bad as Peru in timeliness, and there wasn't even anyone there.  So, we went "sploding" again around the grounds and then headed back for some second breakfast.  Okay, mostly I was thirsty and in need of water, but Henlie decided she also needed a roll and some milk :)  

The kids' club is right next door to the restaurant on the outside, so we were able to keep an eye on how things were progressing.  Around 10:30am, they were pretty much ready to go, so we relocated over there.  This day, they were painting rocks, so they had gone to collect some rocks.  When they got back, Henlie picked out a rock and Daddy helped her paint it.  


She also got to learn to wash her brush between colors, which she did pick up on, but she still needed Daddy's help to actually get it clean :)





She loved painting her rock.  Not that she had anything in particular in mind....just had fun painting multiple colors all over her rock.  She looked at me a couple of times and said, "I painting, Mom!"  So cute :)



Our favorite staffer helped haul our luggage downstairs, and we said ciao and loaded into the car.  The drive was very uneventful, although the border lines were much longer to wait in, and it was hot.  But we eventually made it out of Chile and back into Peru and continued driving back to Tacna.


We opted to get a hotel in Tacna (Gran Hotel Tacna) for the night and fly out again early Friday morning.  Tacna is pretty ghetto.  Alas, we weren't so lucky with our hotel in Tacna as in Arica as they pretty much made us wait until normal check-in time to check in.  Okay, we maybe were able to check in about 15 minutes early.

Anyway, being back in Peru, we knew we could get snacks and whatnot, and we needed some water and breakfast for the next morning.  They watched our luggage for us and told us where the nearest grocery stores were.  We walked down to the Plaza Vea.  It was fabulous.  Plaza Vea is like Peru's Walmart lol  I was so at home lol.  Matt, no surprise, hated it.  But, there is only one so it was kind of crowded.  Anyway, we bought some snacks (because we were hungry) and bought some cinnamon rolls for breakfast, along with some water.  Then we took a taxi back to the hotel (which was like S/.3 or something ridiculous like that.  Matt says he doesn't think he's ever paid less than S/.6 in Lima for a short drive.) and hung out in the lobby waiting to check in.

Eventually, we got checked in and checked out our room.  The room was decent, but toasty.  Fortunately, there was a fan.  I certainly missed the ocean breeze!  Then we decided to head to a local restaurant recommended by the hotel staff for some lunch/dinner.  



We walked a few blocks over to The Da Vinci Restaurant Cafe.  It was pretty crowded when we got there, but we found a seat.  Henlie totally fell asleep for a nap while we waited for food, and stayed that way until we were ready to leave.  However, the food was amazingly delicious and bigger portion sizes than we were anticipating.  We took the leftovers with us back to the hotel in case we wanted an actual dinner later. (We didn't - so much food!)  Matt changed his $10,000 pesos into soles at a street exchange and we walked back to the hotel, where we hung out all night watching TV.  Henlie ate Daddy's leftover fries and snacked on cookies for lunch/dinner.


The next morning, we were up bright and early (although not as early as our first flight!) to check in for our flight back to Lima.  I was very much ready to leave Tacna.  Our hotel was nice, but the area is less-so.  Our flight was at like 7:15am, and we got there at about 6:30am.  Aurelio had offered to pick us up and take us to the airport again, but Matt never got ahold of him.  Instead, we just had the front desk call us a cab.

Check-in was fun.  Lots of people were there waiting in lines before even the staff had arrived.  Tacna is a tiny airport with only one gate, so it wasn't too bad.  We got through and sat down.  They had a little cafe and gift shop, but their cafe only sold coffee and maybe a few pastries.  We already had our cinnamon rolls at the hotel (not as good as I was hoping :( ) and we don't drink coffee.....but we did kill some time wandering through the gift shop.  Henlie, more than once.  She went through with me, and then she made Daddy go through with her lol.


Eventually we got boarded and back on the plane to Lima.  The flight was pretty uneventful.  We got our stuff, got a taxi at the airport, and came home.  All-in-all, it was a pretty fun trip! Kind of annoying we had to take it, but we had a good time and got to visit somewhere we wouldn't have otherwise gone :)

We continued driving and learned that Arica has a lot of olive orchards.  We didn't buy any olive oil, but apparently they make some good stuff...  Then we made it out to the Museo Arqueológico y Antropológico de San Miguel de Azapa.  It has like 3 main sections.  First, we went inside and walked through some exhibits.  Matt, understanding Spanish, could just listen to our guide explain things.  Fortunately for me, they also had typed up stuff in English and Spanish, so I got an English guide.  It made me a little slower trying to read and then look, but it was still enjoyable. :)

Next, we took a potty break (okay, I did. Yay being pregnant :))  They had a banana tree on the walk over, and we learned a little about how banana trees work.  Matt thought it was neat.

After that, we headed to the fancy new part of the museum.  At least this section is in partnership or funded by or something....with a university. 

After the museum, we stopped to look at some petroglyphs.  They weren't that exciting, and it was hot, so we left pretty quickly.  All told, we had been out about 3 hours (which was how long I had predicted we'd last anyway), so we had our driver take us back to the hotel.  Matt paid about $80 USD for our entire tour, and received $10,000 CLP (Chilean pesos) back in change from his $100 USD.

Back at the hotel, we thought about going to the pool, but we didn't.  We did a late lunch/early dinner of room service (which had a more palatable menu than the restaurant) and we vegged, showered, and watched TV.  The food was quite tasty.  I had some arroz con pollo.  I don't remember what Matt got, but he had french fries, which was pretty much all Henlie would eat lol.


That night, we watched the beautiful sunset from our window.  I could sit and listen to the ocean for hours....








And a bonus sleeping Henlie picture.  Her little hands on her face are so cute :)


More to come in another post!