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Arica - The city of eternal spring.
The climate and beaches attract thousands of visitors each year. A relaxed, safe, beach resort city of 170,000 population. An ideal place to take a break from your travels.
The sands of Chinchorro beach continue more than 20km to the frontier with Peru. Playa Laucho to the south of the city has recently been remodeled and like La Licera an enclosed beach is popular at weekends.
Summer temperatures seldom exceed 28 degrees centigrade and cold winter days never fall below 10 degrees centigrade. There is some sun virtually every day of the year.
Arica is a cross roads for visitors to Peru and Bolivia. It is an entry point to the national park "Parque Nacional Lauca" A unique area of native lands (137,888ha) with Lago Chungara, (21.5 sq. km) a lake 4,500 meters above sea level as its focal point. Surrounded by volcanoes mostly over 6,000 meters high the lake supports a wide range of bird life, has spectacular scenery, numerous trekking opportunities and abundant wildlife.
Civilization in Arica dates back 9,600 years to the shell fish gatherers of Chinchorro, who made mummies of their dead 3,000 years prior to those of Egypt. The Bolivian based culture of Tiwanaku (800 AC to 800 BC) had links to peoples of Arica with well formed trade routes through the Azapa and Lluta Valleys that lead inland from the coast.
The "Museo Arqueological San Miguel de Azapa" has an excellent presentation of time frame development and complements an archaeology tour of the Azapa Valley to see the museum, the ruins of the defensive fortified town of the "San Lorenzo", the "Geoglifos de Alto Ramirez", Atoca, and Cerro Sombrero. Massive interesting rock mosaics dating back 1,000 to 1,400 years.
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