Blogs from San Pedro de Atacama, Antofagasta Region, Chile, South America - page 2

Finally we get on the Road. The new battery arrived on time and Pete fitted it into Nikki's bike that evening and checked the charge on the other bikes and all were good to go. We finally got away from Vina del Mar at 10.00am and headed North up the coast via Concon and Zappella, finally joining the Pan Pacific highway and onto Tongoy, a quaint little fishing village just south of Coquimbo, where we were welcomed by Marcela. We had a day off in Tongoy, so we all rode up to Coquimbo to check out the Cross of the Third Millennium, then onto Andacolla for lunch and check out the corrugated iron and wooden church of the Virgin of Andacolla and then the long way home to Tongoy via Ovalle. This was a 287km ride ... read more

Direction l'Amérique du Sud Je crois que j'ai pris plus souvent l'avion pendant ce voyage que de fois où j'ai pris le tram depuis que je suis à Bordeaux. C'est devenu banal pour moi. Rien que pour aller de la dernière ville visitée en Nouvelle Zélande à Ushuaïa il m'en faudra 4. L'avion que je prend depuis Auckland pour Santiago du Chili décolle à 18h30. Pendant ce seul vol de 10 heures je vais assister au coucher du soleil puis à son lever, changer de jour et arriver avant de partir... Sensation très bizzare. Je ne pense pas que je revivrai ça dans ma vie. On s'apprête à atterrir et j'essaie de remettre mes chaussures mais elles sont devenues trop petites. En fait c'est mes pieds qui ont gonflé du fait de l'immobilisation dans l'avion. Je ... read more

We crossed the Bolivian boarder at the end our salt flat tour and kept the wheels in motion. We knew that after leaving Bolivia our pace was going to speed up a bit and we weren't wrong. We had our first taste of Chile when we arrived in San Pedro de Atacama, a small town within the driest desert in the world. Unfortunately we only spent one night in San Pedro but could've devoted much more time exploring the surrounding desert landscape. But anyone who knows Kristine well enough knows that she does not want to let a single minute pass without getting everything she can from it....not a bad quality but be prepared to have activities from morning to night! So with our one day in San Pedro before catching an overnight bus we rented ... read more

Geo: -22.9058, -68.1951Oruro to San Pedro de Atacama in Chile - 2nd to 9th NovemberWe left Oruro by train and it was a lovely journey, partly due to the standard of comfort of the train itself but also to the scenery. The train leaves Oruro twice a week and is quite an event. We checked our luggage in, as on an aeroplane, and did not see it again until it arrived in the luggage office in Uyuni. People were allowed on the train an hour before departure time so it was very relaxed with many Bolivian people having their families on board to settle them in, buy them drinks, papers etc then make their farewells when the train was due to depart. The train was in excellent condition, comfortable and clean, and the meal we ate ... read more

With time and money almost anything is possible. I don't know anyone who has limitless supplies of both, so then it's all about choices. The last time I came to South America five years ago I ran out of both time and money, and I couldn't visit some of the places that I had been dreaming about. But five years later I'm back and this time my choices will get me there. First up is the Atacama Desert - the driest desert in the world, with scenery that is truly spectacular. It was a very long journey to get here, with two flights and one bus, however thanks to the magic of the international date line, after leaving Sydney on Saturday morning I arrived in San Pedro de Atacama on Saturday evening just in time for ... read more