Desert and Dunes

  San Pedro de Atacama, Chile
Saturday, December 15, 2007

While waiting at the bus station in Iquique I couldn't find my passport.  I normally put it in my jacket pocket or money belt but I wasn't wearing either so I had just put it in my jeans pocket.  I was fairly certain it fell out when I paid the taxi driver but I did a cursory check in my bag anyway.  Passport was nowhere to be found but I didn't really get very upset/worried.  It was either somewhere in my bag or I would have to apply for a new one in Santiago which was to be my next destination.   

Taking the loss of my passport in stride I boarded yet another overnight bus... six hours from Iquique to Calama, a quick bus change and another one and a half hours from Calama to San Pedro de Atacama and I'm in one of the driest deserts on earth.  Why come here you ask... why not I say?  Exiting the bus I meet Natali who isn't sure where she wants to stay.  Together we wander town for an hour or two going from hostal to hostal looking for reasonably priced (i.e. cheap) accommodation in a dorm room.  Once we found somwhere to stay the next task was to arrange a tour of Valle de la Luna (Valley of the Moon) for the same afternoon/evening - no time to waste!

Salt coming through the rocks

The Valle de la Luna was named for its landscape which is said to resemble the lunar landscape.  I've posted pictures so you can judge for yourself.  The standard trip here is to walk around the valley for a hour or so and then head to the top of a sand dune for sunset.  As we walked, we could here cracking sounds in the rocks.  Something to do with the salt rising to the surface of the rocks.  It would be a little eerie if you were alone but in the group you had to concentrate to even hear it.  Unfortunately the dune had become somewhat unstable after a recent earthquake so we watched from the hills.  Apparently there were two quakes during the night that I slept through.  
The following is a release by the United States Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center:
An earthquake occurred 55 km (35 miles) SSE of Tocopilla, Chile, 110 km (65 miles) W of Calama, Chile, 130 km (80 miles) NNE of Antofagasta, Chile, 1215 km (750 miles) N of SANTIAGO, Chile at 1:09 AM MST, Dec 16, 2007 (5:09 AM local time in Antofagasta, Chile). The magnitude and location may be revised when additional data and further analysis results are available. No reports of damage or casualties have been received at this time. The following is a release by the United States Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center: An earthquake occurred 55 km (35 miles) SSE of Tocopilla, Chile, 110 km (65 miles) W of Calama, Chile, 130 km (80 miles) NNE of Antofagasta, Chile, 1215 km (750 miles) N of SANTIAGO, Chile at 1:09 AM MST, Dec 16, 2007 (5:09 AM local time in Antofagasta, Chile). The magnitude and location may be revised when additional data and further analysis results are available. No reports of damage or casualties have been received at this time. 
Tocopilla is about 220km NW of San Pedro de Atacama which means I was about 170km from the epicentre.  I was told that the beds shook but I was out cold.  I have to say I'm a little disappointed... I would have like to have experienced what an earthquake felt like.

Top of dune

The next day we signed ourselves up for the Lakes and Altiplano tour which took us to a couple of beautiful salt lakes and the Salar de Atacama (Atacama Salt Flats).  The salt flats are the third largest in the world after those in Bolivia and Salt Lake City, Utah.  They're much different than the Salar in Bolivia of which I've only seen pictures but plan to visit.  There were still a few flamingoes here but apparently most have moved to lakes higher in the Andes. 

Having decided that this town is very expensive, we cooked ourselves some pasta for dinner and got a bottle of wine and a bottle of pisco from the bottle shop.  We drank the wine with dinner and the pisco we drank with the Brazilian and Spanish people we met at the hostal.  After both bottles were emptied we headed to the bar for one or two more and ended up on the edge of town with people we met somewhere (possibly at the bar, possibly in the street).  The party kind of died out there and we returned to the hostal.  We had booked the 4:30 am tour of the geyers and hotsprings for the next day but didn't quite have it in us to wake up.  I'm not really sure why we went to sleep in the first place but I really didn't think I would miss the tour.  I suppose pisco packs more of a punch than rye! 

Oh well, not to worry.  The Brazilians/Spanish were renting bikes and cycling out to Laguna Cejas - a beautiful lake that a couple of Natali's friends (whom we ran into at the bar) had been to the other day.  I saw pictures and it looked like a refreshing oasis in the desert.  We hummed and hawed about whether or not we had enough time to get out there and back in time for our sand boarding at 4pm that afternoon.  

Desert tree

The bike rental place said it was only 18kms so I figured an easy one hour ride.  The lake turned out to be almost 30kms away and we made it to within 15 minutes before deciding we had to turn around if we were to make it back to town for the sandboarding.  Oh well, no lake, but a nice bike ride in the desert.

In town with just enough time to grab a bite to eat and fill the water bottle before hoping back on the bikes to cycle to the Valle de la Muerte (Valley of the Dead) for our sandboarding adventure.  Seems like an appropriate name!  Our instructor had cycled with us from town but there was another very enthusiastic guy that grabbed Natali's board to show us how it was done.  Our instructor explained that this guy was "uno experto" and we proceeded to watch the guy expertly fall on his ass not once, but twice before giving up.  After that encouraging display we trudged up the sand and proceeded to wax our boards with regular wax candles.  A crowd was gathering at the base of the dune in anticipation of our impending wipeouts.  

Me sandoarding

Their hopes were thwarted when we decided our first couple of runs would be down the backside of the dune out of the spectators sight.  After some very brief instructions, our instructor was the first to go.  He faired no better then his expert friend and I was beginning to think that this sport has a lot of growing to do yet.  One more try for the instuctor and more sand flying as he plows head first into the dune. 

Natali and I quickly realize why many places in town simply rent the boards and don't even bother with instructors.  We figure that we're not going to learn anything by watching someone else fall and decide to give it a go.  We've waxed our boards really well and go flying through the sand like bats out of hell and both wipe out not far from the top of the dune.  Undeterred we climb back up to the top to try again.  The wind in the afternoon is brutal and blows sand in our faces... ears, nose, everwhere!  No matter, there's already sand everywhere from our spills.  We eventually start to understand how the wax wears away the more you ride so that if you can stay standing for the first few seconds of your run you slow down enough to keep some control.  On the other hand, not enough wax to start means you really can't even get going.  We have some fun, get some pictures, but once we're out of water I can't last much longer.  We were already tired from our bike ride to the middle of nowhere ealier in the day so we called it quits and started the ride back to town.  We're shocked to realize that we'd been coming uphill nearly the whole way to the dune and the ride back is extremely pleasant.  I let gravity take over and zip a little ahead of Natali and the instructor, stopping a couple of times to wait and watch the sunset.  

Natali and I on top of the dune

A fun few days in the desert but time to move on.  Does it matter that I missed the geyser tour and never made it to the lake?  Sure I would have liked to see them but I'm not here in South America for destinations and tours.  Traveling for me is about the experiences (good and bad) and the people I meet along the journey.