Moon Valley (Valle de la Luna) San Pedro de Atacama

For my last trip in Chile, I finally made it to the gorgeous northern region. The Atacama Desert, located in the north of Chile, is the world's driest desert. There are parts of this region that have never recorded rainfall! The town of San Pedro de Atacama is also known for beautiful landscape and tours. My friend Haley and I flew to San Pedro in …

After another long journey from La Serena, I arrive in the middle of the desert in San Pedro de Atacama. This is a very small town, with basically one main street for tourist's agencies and maybe 10 other streets.

Friday 27.04.2012

I have to wait for Benny in the hostel Adobe. He is supposed to arrive around 17:30. I wait in …

Pour la cinquième et dernière fois je passe la frontière Argentine-Chili. Mon bus est d'abord retardé d'une journée, puis nous partons sans trop savoir si la route est ouverte. Effectivement, ça passe pas! Un bus a tenté la piste de sable et ils ont passé la nuit là, à 4000m d'altitude. Une aventure plutôt sympa, paumés dans la cordillère, je me ré …

Friday 13^th Jan


We get off the bus in Calama around 9am, we walk wrong way trying to find tur-bus terminal as Simon assures me it was "this way". It wasn't. We head back the other way and lo! Find it. Bought tickets to San Pedro de Atacama from tur-bus on the next available bus, which was in about an hour. All went …

I could write a really long blog about San Pedro de Atacama because I love the place! But I will try to keep it short and let the photo's do the talking this time.

After a long journey we finally arrived in one of the highest desserts in the world. We have visited Death Valley (yes they have one here too!), caves and saw the sunset over …

Apologies for the slight delay in blogs...couple of technical issues coupled with me (Lindsay) not feeling well for a few days has slowed down the progress! Hope you have enjoyed them so far though.

... So here we are in San Pedro de Atacama and I was feeling a lot more bright today and ready to explore the town (which is one street) and …

Going to San Pedro de Atacama from Uyuni is definetly an interesting trip, probably unlike most land crossings. Because the border is open during what you can call business hours, and the trip takes so long through the rugged terrain, the jeep service that does this route leaves in the afternoon, includes dinner and a nice warm bed half way to the …

Bienvenido a San Pedro de Atacama!

San Pedro de Atacama ist eine Oase in der chilenischen Atacamawüste und gehört zur Región de Antofagasta. Der Ort liegt auf 2.443 m Höhe am nördlichen Rand des Salar de Atacama, einer grossen Salzablagerung in der Atacamawüste und ist ein beliebtes Ziel für Wüsten-Touristen aus aller Welt. Das Wasser für …

As I get off the bus a gust of wind surrounds me with dust. On the short walk to the main square, you can mainly see tourists walking around. The locals and the seemingly ever present dogs are resting the afternoon away indoors or under some thick shadow. In the driest desert on the planet the sun is strong and merciless to those that ignore it.

Finishing the salt flats tour in Uynui (Bolivia's most uninteresting town and shithole), we were faced with the difficult task of finding transport to cross the border into San Pedro de Atacama, Chile. In the early afternoon, Sarah guarded our bags while I walked around Uyuni streets to bus companies, asking if anyone was leaving that afternoon. I …

... and Lauren Feldman (Chicago), Katie Taylor (Chicago) and Sarah Sanderson (Holland, Michigan)-planned to relax and take a tour to Moon Valley, the area's biggest tourist pull. More on that later. Back at the hotel, the pathetic little radiator, which ...

... 's height were really no surprise, since she'd had only two plane flights-worth of time to acclimate. Interestingly enough, my guide to Moon Valley was Tomás, whom we'd dined with the night before. He was a tall, lanky fellow, with a strange right ...

... of the areas taller hills, was probably the best viewpoint of the area yet, with views of the salt lake, death valley, the dunes, the Andes and San Pedro all in one. We took some pictures, sat around for a while and raced back down the hill and back ...

... we were still in the same country. The plane landed in Calama, which is about 90 minutes from where I was staying in San Pedro de Atacama. The drive there was stunning. It was my first taste of how varied the desert landscape can be, not just ...

... we are really looking forward to visiting. And so with that in mind, we hopped on the bus and headed back into Chile. The bus to San Pedro took about 10 hours and the scenery was stunning.....as was the altitude! Within a couple of hours the road winds ...

MOON VALLEY HIKE - WRAP UP In my last entry, I shared my adventure with Moon Valley and the challenging, yet rewarding climb to the top. Once there, I tried not to think about the inevitable - the descent! Instead, I enjoyed catching my breath, which ...

... valley on our own for a couple of hours. The fact that we were the only tourists made the experience even better. Like the Moon Valley there is salt everywhere which is very wierd. Because of the salt and the minerals, the rocks sparkle and glisten. ...

... that would drive us to the Chilean boarder and then on to San Pedro de Atacama. The drive from the Bolivian boarder to San Pedro de Atacama was down hill the entire way as we descended more than a thousand meters into the Atacama Desert and judging from ...

... weather was a you might expect the weather to be in a desert area: hot and dry. We decided to visit the ´Valle de la Luna´ or Moon Valley. The valley got it´s name because of all the strange shapes of rocks there caused by wind erosion. We had ...

... the huge peaks and volcanos of the Andes came into view. We crossed the foothills and entered a vast valley and caught our first glimpse of San Pedro de Atacama: a green oasis in the middle of an expansive valley hemmed in by the Andes, the Salt ...