Dry mouth in the Atacama!

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Our 9 hour bus ride from Salta to San Pedro De Atacama was definately one of our better journeys on the trip so far, we slowly climbed up into the Andes with some amazing scenery along the way. The road winded its way up and up with the rocks and mountains constantly changing as we went. This was also our first sightings of Llamas by the roadside and a huge salt flat in the middle of nowhere. It took about 7 hours to reach the Argentian border which was a small brick building with nothing around it but desolute mountains, when we got out the bus we also felt a big difference in temperature being so high up. After getting our exit stamps we borded the bus again and i thought we would then go through Chilian customs but it was another 2 hours of driving before we reached the border control. With the town of San Pedro de Atacama in sight we thought it would be just a quick stamp then onto the hostel, how foolish of me to think it would be that simple! We had to wait for 3 hours in the scorching dry heat of the Atacama desert to get the stamp in our passports. After Emilie nearly passing out in the heat we were well ready for a shower. Next problem of course was finding our bloody hostel, after getting directions from tourist information, two locals and some wild dogs we eventually found our ´duluxe´ place of rest in what can only be described as a cross between the ghetto and a favela!!

I genuinly thought a mugging would now finish off the day in style, but it turned out to be totally safe. Surffice to say after a shower we headed straight out for a much needed beer!!



San Pedro is a tiny place overun by tourists starting or finishing four wheel drive tours across the desert to the salt flats in Bolivia, but still manages to retain its old Spanish colonial charm. As you can imagine water is scarce in the desert and having not received rain for 200 years in some parts makes it one of the driest places on earth. Caryying bottled water is essential at all times as just opening your mouth to speak dries it out, you dont even realise your sweating as it evaporates so quickly off your skin!

With this in mind we thought it would be the perfect place to do some sand bording. Obviously once Em had overcome her initial fears of dying she was a natural, but spending 15 minutes walking up the dunes for 30 seconds to come down soon took its tole on both of us. Fortunatley the trip was finished off with sunset in ´Valley de la luna´ the closest place on earth to the surface of the moon, which was a pretty cool experience.



Being in the middle of the desert with no light pollution, cloud cover and at 2500 metres above sea level makes it the perfect place for some star gazing. Its also now the location of the Alpha project, 60 of the largest telescopes in the world. We therefore did a trip out to a French astronomers set of 12 telescopes at 11.30 at night for some amazing views of stars, planets, galaxies and shooting stars, another amazing experience!



After a few days in the Atacama desert we were now aclimatized and ready for our three day trip in a 4X4 vehicle to the salt flats of Uyuni in Bolivia.

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Comments

[the best sister in the world]

oh my picture three made me laugh em! but it looks good! can't believe you got to sand board!! looks like this place was amazing!