Today was a highlight - again. We didn't reach the moon but saw how it might look up there.
Ok, the day started after a night of little sleep - either Peter snoring or guests coming in or
leaving or just plain cold. It can be cold at night even inside a house. Oh well, after a hearty
empanada we drive off. About 100 km to San Pedro de Atacama in the Atacama (!) desert. The stretch is done with many stops - I am getting the feeling that it is going to be better than yesterday. First stop is a memorial for some of Pinochet's victims (killed and burried in the desert). Then back to nature, we run over the first vicuñas (a kind of elegant lama). We hit some 3200 m altitude (isn't it good to have all those gadgets?) and as close to the moon as it gets ... for today. Then back down a bit: Cordillera de Sal sticks out of the middle of a flat, it's rugged and locks as if the ground had been plowed, just of course bigger, hundreds of meters high so
to speak. Then in that rough mountain some soft dunes of dark sand. Trigger happy I fill the
first 1 GB card - still some 8'200 pictures to go though.
San Pedro is a big surprise. Despite the tourists it has maintained its village character. At the plaza we enjoy a typical lunch (salmon from Calama). At around 3 o'clock we take off to the desert heading to the Valle de la luna (valley of the moon). Its name is from the lunar shapes it takes. The plan is the watch the sun set and the colors on the mountains around it. As some English blokes say: It's a bit of a key feature of mountains turning red when the sun sets. What makes this amazing is the variety of looks it's offering.
Key features of the day:
I will have to add some pictures later on because it's just mind blowing. Among others there are salt structures crackling under your shoes then there are some mountains that look as if covered with adobe "mud" and remind me of ice cream toppings.
In the evening something funny happens: A 12-year girl steps in front of me on the parking space of the Valle. In Iquique when taking some pictures two days earlier the same girl came asking for a tool her father needed for the car. Obviously they fixed the car without our help and made it on the same route to San Pedro. And they were also to climb the dune. We took different paths though. Back at our hotel we run into her family again. The girl and her brother earned some Swiss chocolates.
Foot note: Saying "good" today doesn't mean the same "good" as yesterday, it's better but I will run out of adjectives if I don't stick to the basics and the sceneries keep improving as they do.
Ok, the day started after a night of little sleep - either Peter snoring or guests coming in or
leaving or just plain cold. It can be cold at night even inside a house. Oh well, after a hearty
empanada we drive off. About 100 km to San Pedro de Atacama in the Atacama (!) desert. The stretch is done with many stops - I am getting the feeling that it is going to be better than yesterday. First stop is a memorial for some of Pinochet's victims (killed and burried in the desert). Then back to nature, we run over the first vicuñas (a kind of elegant lama). We hit some 3200 m altitude (isn't it good to have all those gadgets?) and as close to the moon as it gets ... for today. Then back down a bit: Cordillera de Sal sticks out of the middle of a flat, it's rugged and locks as if the ground had been plowed, just of course bigger, hundreds of meters high so
to speak. Then in that rough mountain some soft dunes of dark sand. Trigger happy I fill the
first 1 GB card - still some 8'200 pictures to go though.
San Pedro is a big surprise. Despite the tourists it has maintained its village character. At the plaza we enjoy a typical lunch (salmon from Calama). At around 3 o'clock we take off to the desert heading to the Valle de la luna (valley of the moon). Its name is from the lunar shapes it takes. The plan is the watch the sun set and the colors on the mountains around it. As some English blokes say: It's a bit of a key feature of mountains turning red when the sun sets. What makes this amazing is the variety of looks it's offering.
Key features of the day:
I will have to add some pictures later on because it's just mind blowing. Among others there are salt structures crackling under your shoes then there are some mountains that look as if covered with adobe "mud" and remind me of ice cream toppings.
In the evening something funny happens: A 12-year girl steps in front of me on the parking space of the Valle. In Iquique when taking some pictures two days earlier the same girl came asking for a tool her father needed for the car. Obviously they fixed the car without our help and made it on the same route to San Pedro. And they were also to climb the dune. We took different paths though. Back at our hotel we run into her family again. The girl and her brother earned some Swiss chocolates.
Foot note: Saying "good" today doesn't mean the same "good" as yesterday, it's better but I will run out of adjectives if I don't stick to the basics and the sceneries keep improving as they do.
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