Somewhere in Chile – Arica?

The 2007 WCT Tour of Surfing is starting in Australia at the moment, but the reason for this post is some more detective work from me. We already speculated a few months back where will Somewhere in Chile – Rip Curl Search Pro event take place. Pichilemu and Iquique –  Arica region were my guesses. Now, there was a nice clue on the ASP website, I cant find it anymore, but lucky me, I made a snapshot.

Somewhere in Chile background

The press release at the end of 2006 confirmed that the Rip Curl Search Pro 2007 event will really take place Somewhere in Chile. The event has crawled into the Foster’s Men WCT Schedule for the 2007 ad there was quite some talk where in Chile the event might take place.

Santiago – Pichilemu – Punta de Lobos

First why Pichilemu and then why not. Pichilemu is something that Chile surfing is known for. Another reason is the Event locator on the ASP website that puts the Rip Curl Pro Search somewhere near Santiago. Which is where Pichilemu is located together with a big left known as Punta de Lobos. Cold water, harsh conditions are waiting so far south. But could this event marker just point to Chile in general, its in the middle of the country and it doesn’t give away anything. A little decoy. Now what Sherlock?

Arica

Arica is located to the far north of Chile, quite close to Peru. The water there is warmer, the swell is equally consistent. This is what wannasurf has to say: Arica has plenty of Hawaiian style reef breaks. In the South part of the North zone you will find a great variety of breaks waves and reefs. It’s often big and gnarly. The best season is between May to August, although that generally there is enough waves all the year. And the clue? :) Check the picture on the right. This is a snapshot from the pdf file on ASP website that gives some contest details from the Somewhere in Chile Rip Curl Pro Search. I said before that it was gone but ooops, I just found it again :) so you can check it out yourself (link). So the 2007 Somewhere in Chile Rip Curl Pro Search will take place somewhere very near Arica. That’s it for now.