My "pop" across the border

When I entered the Chile I was given a 90 day tourist visa. Well, Saturday was day 90 for me so I needed to either pay $100 to renew it, or simply "pop" over the border to Argentina and get another 90 days upon my return. Sounds simple enough right? Wrong.

Thursday and Friday were a holiday in Chile and so we took advantage of this time to take a little family vacation into the mountains close to the Argentinian border so we could have a little fun and renew my visa in one trip. We got to the beautiful little mountain town of Malalcahuello on Wednesday and checked into a very quaint and beautiful Swiss hostel run by actual Swiss people. Really fun. The next morning my uncle and I got up early, had breakfast, and began what we though would be a 2, maybe 3, hour trip across the border. First of all, it took us an hour to get to the border in a huge rain storm, and when we finally got there it was unlike anything I could have expected. I'm used to crossing the international border between Canada and the U.S. where you just drive through a nice little check point and bang, you're done. Not so at this border crossing. First you have to stop at the Chilean custom office, pull over, and go in the building. Now, contrary to what I had thought, this wasn't actually the border. No no. This was just the check point to leave Chile. I had to wait in line and get a nice little stamp in my passport saying that I had left Chile. Then, we had to get back in the car and drive an additional 15 miles to the border, and an additional 3 to get to the Argentinian check point. My uncle couldn't go across the border for some reason so he pulled over and let me go in while he just sat in the car. When I got into the office there were about 25 people in front of me in line with one man getting them through. Not to mention the fact that the power was out so he was trying to do all this in the dark, with no computer, and just writing information down on pieces of paper. When I finally got to the front of the line I had to try and explain to this man in my rough Spanish why I wanted to go into Argentina, turn around, and leave. It did not go smoothly, but at least the power came back on while I was talking to him. He stamped my passport saying I had entered Argentina and then I had to go outside, turn around and come in the other side of the building. By this time I was getting very funny looks from the rest of the border crossing officials and had to go through the entire process again to leave Argentina. I was in there for an hour and a half with me just standing in line and my poor uncle waiting for me in the car. We then had to get back in the car and drive the 18 miles back to the Chilean office to re-enter Chile before the process was over. We were gone for 6 hours! Yikes!

Thankfully though the town of Malalcahuello is known for its hot springs. Oh yeah! After the stressful and disastrous trip across the border, we all went to the hot springs and had a wonderful time hanging out at the lovely Swiss hostel. Overall, great little holiday, but if anyone ever says to just "pop" over the border to renew your visa, do the opposite and just pay the fee.