There wasn't much else to do today except visit the San Miguel de Azapa museum. It's the most famous one in Arica, maybe in all of Chile because it contains a room of Chincorro mummies, some of the oldest in the world (much older than those of Egypt).
I was nervous because going there required weird public transportation. I made my way to the city and thankfully found the yellow taxi station (these are the ones that go to rural places, whereas the typical mostly-black with a little bit of yellow taxis stay in the city). I told the driver I wanted to go to the museum and got in. The way these "taxis" - actually called collectivos - work is that you don't have to pay as much (1000 CLP) but you share it with however many people the driver wants. It took about 20-25 minutes to get to the stop, but the driver took me right to the street with the museum, and I had to walk maybe a minute to get to the entrance.
The museum itself was quite awesome! It was one of those that had English translations but in a little booklet instead of on the walls (where there was only Spanish). It was a little difficult to navigate and enjoy, but the first of two rooms/series of exhibits was thorough in explaining the archaeological history of the region. Apparently, the Azapa Valley (where the museum was located, right outside Arica) is the ideal place to plant olives. They are extremely popular to grow, especially to make olive oil, which is shipped all over the world.
The second series of exhibits in the museum was the one that people go crazy for - the Chinchorros. They are a group of people who lived a long time ago (sometime BCE) and famous for their advances in many things. This exhibit was a lot smaller than the other, but it showed all kinds of their tools and fabrics and dyes - and then also what they're most famous for. Aka MUMMIES.
I wasn't super sure if the mummies were real or replicas or whatever because their sizes were extraordinarily small. It may have been that people so long ago were just much, much shorter and smaller than people are now, but I'm a little skeptical about that. Anyway, they had all kinds of mummies - whole bodies and just parts - and it creeped me out more than a little.
Out in the courtyard of the museum they had a couple geoglyphs that had been imported from the area to protect them from vandalism and such. I had expected more, but you could see some cute little figures of a sun-like object that was pretty cool on the most obvious stone.
After spending almost 3 hours at the museum in total, I was really nervous to get back to the city. It would take another collectivo to get back, but this time, instead of a stop with the collectivos just waiting for your approach, I would have to hail one down like a taxi along the road. I felt a little like a hitchhiker - reminiscent of Humberstone in Iquique - but I made it! I only had to wait about 2 minutes before a yellow collectivo came with room for me. Back in the city, I ended up getting some food (spaghetti) and heading back to the apartment to rest.
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