The wild surfing haven of Iquique, Chile is 28 hours north of the capital Santiago. The waves there are among the biggest I've ever seen but the water turned our poor limbs numb within seconds. This is the cruel joke found on Chilean beaches.

The sun was making me feel like a used candle. I was melting away but when I jumped into the sea for relief, I was met with the kind of water you'd encounter in Dunedin in winter.

I stood there in disbelief trying not to squeal like a girl, shaking my head at this strange ocean. Marcelo in La Serena had told us there is a cool current running up Chile from its Antarctic area. Cool? Icy more like it.

Iquique (pronounced eye-gee-gay as far as I could ascertain) seemed to me like it modelled itself on Baywatch. From our surfer dude hostel we could see the beach and it looked like a 90s television show. Pammy never ran past but there were bars with straw-thatched rooves, roller bladers and kitsch lifeguard towers.

Grumpy because the sea had failed to be my normal idea of paradise, I found a new kind of utopia in Chile's favourite cocktail - the Pisco Sour. I liked it so much I felt like I was cheating on the caipirinha. But it seals my love for Chile really. You can't knock a country with a damn great national cocktail.

Tune in next time when I'll tell you why it's a bad idea to go to South America without doing any planning.

Check out more photos from my trip in my Flickr album.

Find out about Chile.

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