For anyone who decides to venture into the deep southern regions of South America, I am giving you fair warning that it is a most difficult venture. The initial struggle began with figuring out flights in and out of the region. When we would find a flight that would work, it would mysteriously disappear before we could book it. The prices would double or triple depending on the day of the week, time of the flight, etc. We finally located a flight from Cartegena to Cali, Colombia on one airline. Then, a flight from Cali to Antofagasta, Chile. Where is Antofagasta you ask? I have no idea but it was the right price, time and day so it won the ticket-go-round. I won’t even get into the return home yet…we will save that for another day. Our flight to Antofagasta was around 4 hours and I believe anyone who lived in Antofagasta that had 12 children was on our flight. They screamed and carried on the entire flight so we were very happy to land in Chile for our night in a town neither of us had ever known about prior to a few weeks ago. I must say, Antofagasta, Chile was a very nice city! It was late so we had time to grab a quick meal at the local Peruvian restaurant (our choices were Peruvian, Italian or Indian, go figure). Antofagasta was located on the Peruvian border so I am guessing it has been part of Peru at least once in its’ history. The next morning, we hurried to catch the bus to our actual destination, the Atacama Desert. For the first time in our history of buses, we had an excellent 3 hour bus ride with no one sitting on our lap, no stops to pick up cousins and friends and no livestock. We caught a taxi at the bus station to take us to the rental car office. We had been driving about 5 minutes when I realized my cell phone was missing. We searched all the bags but no phone. The taxi driver turned around and raced for the gas station where he knew the bus would be re-fueling. I climbed aboard the bus and searched but no cell phone. We headed back to the station to search but no cell phone. At that point, we began to question whether I had lost the phone or whether someone had picked the phone. Since it was never turned in, we had to lean toward the picking. Unfortunately, my phone was the main source of our travel information and travel apps. Not wanting the loss to ruin our trip, we decided to worry about the phone situation once we got to a larger city so I had a good pout and we continued on our way. Driving from Calama, Chile to San Pedro de Atacama was like being on the moon. I expected the Atacama to be flat and brown. It was not. It was very mountainy and brown. The “city” of San Pedro was made up of a few blocks of dirt roads, a ton of hostel-type accommodations and a smattering of restaurants. It was the type of place where you could walk and know that your phone would not be lifted! Our first day in the Atacama, we headed to Rainbow Valley. Bill had studied the map and figured out we needed to take the fourth road on the right. The main issue was figuring out what Google constituted as a road. There were roads that looked like roads, paths that could have possibly been a road, rocky spots that wanted to be roads and spots that people just made their own road. After a few u-turns, we finally decided we were on an official road heading in the right direction. Our decision was supported by the fact that there were llama crossing signs along the road. It was very difficult to get lost enroute because there was only one road and it just went straight ahead. When we got into the mountains, we came around a curve and were halted by a farmer and his daughters herding a large group of llamas. To our left was a huge rock wall and to the right was a cliff falling into the river. Neither side offered us an option to get around the llama pack. The farmer expertly maneuvered the llamas to the narrow roadside allowing us to squeeze by and continue on our way. The Rainbow Valley lived up to its’ billing. The cliffs changed from tan brown to a glorious combination of browns, blacks, reds, oranges and greens. From the valley, we made our way across the Rio Grande which I could have leapt across with ease. We followed the river to a small town that was an oasis in the middle of the desert. It was covered with lavender fields and had a quaint church in the center. Locals wandered about while children played in the road. I am not sure how they made a living but it seemed to be a very peaceful spot to live. We spent our afternoon in the Valley de la Luna (Valley of the Moon) which was the most hyped location in the area. The valley did feel like the moon but after the Rainbow Valley, we were a little blasé on the Valley of the Moon. We headed back to our lodging to prepare for our main purpose of the Atacama trip….our star tour. As we were getting ready for a chilly night in the desert, I realized my coat was missing. Bill asked if I was sure I had packed it and I told him I was certain. I must have left it at the hotel in Antofagasta. Sigh, it was to be the trip of missing items. Fortunately, it was a very warm night in the desert so I did not freeze. Our star tour group had about a dozen people and we headed out to the edge of the desert. The reason star tours are so popular in the Atacama is because of the lack of ambient light. The lack of light also makes walking down a dirt road at 10pm a bit challenging but we made it with no disasters. Our tour guide was an Italian astronomer who moved to Atacama to start his own tour business. The tour started with a guide to the constellations which looked much different in the southern hemisphere because they were all backwards to us. We also saw the southern cross which is only visible in the southern hemisphere so another bucket list item checked. Our guide then explained about the formation and aging of stars. He had two high powered telescopes that he trained on stars of different ages so we could see the difference in brightness levels and clarity. Just staring above us, we could see the milky way spreading from horizon to horizon and the amount of stars was astonishing. All the screaming children on flights, bus rides and lost phones were worth it to get to that moment.
Day two in the Atacama, we drove back into the unknown in search of hot springs and flamingos. We were not expecting much from the flamingo search because let’s face it, our past flamingo adventures have generally resulted in either no flamingos or large blobs of pink in the distance. After a 40 minute drive through ever-changing terrain, we rounded a mountain and came upon a lagoon filled with flamingos! They were white flamingos because obviously there were no shrimp in the desert lagoon. It was like a scene from the Lorax (before the Onceler destroyed the Swomee Swans). Reluctantly, I got back in the car and we headed down from the mountains to the hot springs. Along the way, we were amazed at how the terrain varied mile to mile. At some points, it was covered in green and yellow brush. Then, it would turn to huge piles of rocks followed by endless views of flat clay. When we came upon the streams covered in Pampas grass as far as the eye could see, we ruled the day a complete success. It was a good thing we were happy with our day because when we arrived at the hot springs, they had closed for a three hour lunch break so we decided our life would still be complete without the hot springs experience and we headed back to town. We wrapped up the Atacama leg of the trip with a drive back to Calama to catch a flight to Santiago, Chile. On the way, Bill needed to stop at a local Ford dealer to see if he could locate a thermostat we needed for Larry the Lehman engine on Galt that had eluded us in Colombia. As I waited in the car, I had to laugh at the irony of sitting in the middle of the desert in Chile while Bill visited an American car dealership looking for a boat part. Life is definitely interesting! ***More pics on pictures tab
1 Comment
Pat
4/8/2024 03:39:38 pm
Only a few words -Y’ALL ARE INCREDIBLE 😀
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AuthorSally Miller Archives
May 2024
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