La Valle de la Luna & Bye Bye Chile

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Greetings again from the driest desert on earth. In the most extreme places i´ve been told, it hasn´t rained here for 400 years. Cant get much drier than that. San Pedro the town i´m staying in, i must say is really nice. It´s got a very small town, hippy, colourful vibe mostly where everything is at a slow pace and none of the buildings are much taller than i am. Unfortunately i imagine it wont stay like this for long and the begginings of uber tourism are definately evident (i suppose vistors here 10 years ago would say its too developed now). Still for the moment its a very nice place to be, and certainly seems to be THE backpacker meeting pount of Chile.

Since the town takes no time at all the sus out, yesterday i cycled ouit in the morning to explore some fantastic old Inca ruins and caves in the morning and then in the afternoon i went along on one of the many tours that are offered from here out into the desert and specifically the Valley of the Moon. Although the tour was extremely touristy it was still a very good way to see all there is on offer in the area, fairly cheap and with guides that actually seem pretty well informed as well as being entertaining. Sadly without pictures (boo to the computers out here) its impossible for me to describe exactly what i saw. Basically the tour centered around the Death Valley (so called because nothing lives out there) which is a huge crimson red canyon along a falult line with numerous mini-hilly things rising out creating fantastic scenes of shadowy wizzyness (apologies for the strange imagery but its very out of this world in appearance - think mars X moon X kinderscout in Derbyshire). Then onto some salt caves - deep caverns in the same kind of rock with salt crystals creating dazzling bright white areas. Then listening to the talking hills (hills with loads of saline which have huge cracks that expand and contract in the sun making eerie creeking noises). Then to the highlight - sunset over the valley of the moon. The valley itself is a huge area of the smae kind of red rock and bright white salt covering which truns into a myriad of colours as the sun sets. Every couple of seconds the whole picture changes which makes for fantastic viewing and also the useage of much of my memory card on my camera. All of this is set against a backdrop of huge mountains along the Andes which seperates this area of Chile form Bolivia. As i said i cant really explain but hopefully will post some pictures soon. The evening was then completed with a good old sing-a-long around the hostel campfire and star gazing with the vague outlines of the mountains in the distance. Really cant reccomend coming here enough, as the scenery alone is so unique and amazing. Anyway enough yabbering on.

As mentioned before sadly my time here on cHile is nearly at an end as i haver to keep pushing on and seeing things. Tommorow i get the train from nearby Calama to the Bolivian town of Uyuni just over the border. Meant to be rather a cold affiar and the timings (Bolivian) can range from 10 hours to 20 hours depending on how the train driver feels and if the chaps at the border like the look of you or not.

So Bye Bye to Chile, its been a short but extremely enjoyable time.

I´M goinmg to have to stop now before i kill this compute keyboard. Seems intent on putting something totsally different from what i want tro type.

marc

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Photos

Valle De La Luna
None views much better at sunset i think

The Salt Caves Entance
Mighty hot but mighty nice

Me and the 2.5 Marias
Very unsporting for a toursit to break the one on the left

Biking
The morning before the Valle tour

The edge of the world
Looking out to Atacama desert

Donde...?
Africa...South America. Who knows ??

Marc and the Valle de la Luna
just like outer space

Face
Multiples of

Death Valley
Nowt there at all

Salt mounds
also a nice rock thingy

Moony
The landscape that is

Comments

[Nina & Anneli]

Hi Marc! This is a message from the to swedes you met on the delayed plane to Santiago... Remember?! We have read your journal and seen the pictures. It seems as if you are having a great time. We are too, but in Peru... Today we came to Arequipa, after a few lazy days i Huacachina (a very cool oasis in the Peruvian desert). The day after tomorrow we are going to Colca Canyon and to see the great Condors! We don´t know about Bolivia jet but well find out when we come to Puno in a few days time! Take care and safe travels! /Nina And Anneli