Blogs from San Pedro de Atacama, Antofagasta Region, Chile, South America - page 16

Day 4 was an early one! We got a wake up call at 4 a.m. I yelled at Catie to answer it since it was by her bed. She was just going to ignore it. She answered it but then struggle to hang up the phone. It was entertaining. It was too early for hotel breakfast so I just ate a banana that I had. I had some Coca tea while we were waiting in the lobby for the bus so I wouldn´t get altitude sickness. I sat by Christina on the bus. It was a long, extremely bumpy, off-road ride. I slept for a while. It was hard to sleep for me because I was by the heater and it was cranked up. I was so warm! I think we arrived sometime between 7 and ... read more

I am writing this on Friday, October 23rd after a long week trip to the desert. Let's see how much I remember! Tues, Oct 13 I had class today from 10-12, and afterwards, I met up with Andrea (on Sunday we had decided to meet up sometime during the week, so why not Tuesday). I talked to her for about a half hour, and in that half hour my spanish drastically improved. One on one conversations are definitely the way to go :). Afterwards I took a micro home for lunch, but I don't remember what happened after that, haha. Wed, Oct 14 I had class from 10-12 again, and afterwards, I walked to el centro to buy some sunglasses. I decided to buy some from a street vendor, because it took the least time and ... read more

Since my camera gave out a couple of days after my last entry and it took me 3 weeks and 2 changes of countries to get it fixed, I pretty quickly got out of the rythm to keep the blog updated. When I had my camera working again, there was so much to catch up with that I just didn't know where to start. But now that Aric and Sean and their inhuman iternary have left me and, there is time to look back and reflect upon the amazing things that happened and lay on our route. Like the Inca ruins of Pisac that are just one hour from Cusco and in amazingly great shape. On the busride there you get a pretty good peep on Saqsaywaman (yeah, it's pronounced that way), smaller ruins. As we ... read more

After a short flight from Santiago to Calama with a very hairy landing, we hopped on a minibus and arrived an hour later in San Pedro. The landscape was completely different from that of Santiago. Everywhere was sand and distant volcanoes. Nothing appeared to live there, not even cactuses. San Pedro is a small oasis town, surprisingly awash with gringos and Chilean tourists. With your eyes half shut it is a charming town of narrow sand streets and mud/ adobe houses. On closer inspection, nearly every straw roof houses either a tour operator, a pizza place, a trendy wholefood or cappucino shop or a trinket shop. We found ourselves a modest room with hotwater and a very leaky tap, and soon made ourselves at home. Within an hour it looked as if someone had dropped a ... read more

The change from Bolivia to Chile is startling. The 1st thing we noticed is that the roads are so much better, thats not so difficult though as Bolivian roads are very bad. The second thing was that bars and restaurants in San Pedro de Atacama had roaring fires and were warm at night. The 3rd thing was less good - Chile is much more expensive than Bolivia. The reason we´d come here was to see the Valle de la Luna, it was worth the detour. The best time to catch it is in the evening as the sun sets. The colours of the Andes changes almost every second as the sun goes down. Our tour got us there in plenty of time to get a good position on the ridge. It was another fantastic experience to ... read more