Glen & Kathy Cruise the World: Day 13

Today we are in Arica, Chile. Arica has a mild, temperate climate with some of the lowest annual rainfall rates anywhere in the world (average about 1/2 " per year). This is the Atacama desert. However, a week ago they had about 10 inches of rain which has cause flooding and the main road north from Arica is impassable. Arica acts as the main port for the landlocked country of Bolivia and none of the trucks carrying containers can get through. Several of the excursions offered by the ship have been cancelled (not the one we had booked) because of the blocked road.
First we visited a Gothic style San Marcos Church (1876) which has an iron structure designed by Gustave Eiffel. We then traveled up the Azapa valley to visit very nice anthropological museum which has some mummies that are 5000 years old. They we traveled 13 miles south on the Pan American highway to see the desert. We stopped at a place were some sculptures created by Diaz Fleming were. There were some folkloric dancers performing for us. Before we sailed, there were more dancers on the wharf putting on a show fore us.