As stated in the live broadcast, there was a tsunami drill today on the coastal strip of Arica. All those who were there were forced to go to a high area, free of risk in case of such a catastrophe.

I consulted with various people at the hotel about whether it was mandatory or not. Some told me that if I was working I didn't have to, others told me that I did, and given the different versions I opted to stay working in the room at the traditional Hotel Arica, which faces the El Buey wave.

At 11:12 the siren started to sound and a kind of message arrived, not an SMS or a WhatsApp, a way that governments will have to communicate with cell phones in the area.

Nobody came looking for me and I continued working peacefully (I apologize to the authorities if I acted badly, if so, it was due to ignorance).

It turned out that Paulinho, my roommate, came back with the news that while they were doing the drill, a person took the life tube in El Buey, that everyone saw it from above and that it was incredible.

After a while, I moved to work somewhere else so as not to bother Paulinho and I saw that at the Toto restaurant in Romaña he was talking to the great Diego Medina who had seen him in an impressive tube.

The doubt was cleared: The man in the barrel of the drill was the talented and brave goofy footer from Peru.

Toto looked at me and I gave him a congratulatory nod, telling him that a lot of people were talking about his tube. He asked me if I had filmed it and I said no, I told him I was locked in my room.

He was happy with life, but that memory in a sea that has had so many cameras these days was seen to disappoint him that such an impressive wave had not been filmed or photographed.

With that sun and that nice energy I decided to go surfing at the nice Isla, a fun left that breaks next to El Gringo. After, of course, finishing my chronicle of day 2 of the Arica Pro Tour.

In the hallway, in front of my room, Toto was talking to JP Mafias, gesturing, excited, also excited.

I couldn't help but ask him about how it all happened and there I was able to witness one of the most spectacular descriptions of what a session and an epic wave are like.

The story was wonderful. He said that at the same time that the alarms started to sound, a huge series of alarms appeared on the horizon and at the sound of the alarms, Toto said that he doubted whether he had misunderstood whether it was actually a drill or a tsunami warning that was breaking his head.

After the heat, with the alerts still ringing, De Romaña arrived at the lineup and a perfect triangle appeared before him. He paddled hard and then began to gesticulate, bending his knees in the middle of the passage, transmitting such great emotion that it took me inside the biggest tube of my life. He told how he went through sections, how the visual of the giant, blue, perfect tube was incredible. He did a pump and the line remained perfect until a section broke further ahead making the exit more difficult.

“I was left in the air, thinking I wasn’t going to make it, flying inside the tube. But I couldn’t believe it when I was able to hold the line and I said to myself: ‘I’m going to make it!’” she said with her eyes wide open. And she did it.

He told all this while packing his luggage because he was soon going to go to the airport, back to Lima.

Comparing this, he established that wave as the second best of his life, although he doubted a little if it was not the best.

I went to surf a wave that was 10 times smaller, 100 times less scary, 1000 times less tubular. I found my moments and came out satisfied to go back to work.

When I arrived, I met Toto, who had the news that his wave had been filmed with a cell phone. He was happy.

I told him 100 times to send it to me and he delayed but finally he sent it. The video does justice to the story, the sections were falling with him inside and in the last one it seems that he doesn't do it but he comes out victorious.

These are just some of the things that happen in Arica, a city with so much energy that it is difficult to explain.

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