San Pedro de Atacama

exploring the world's driest desert

By Heather & Pravin

May 13^th, 2017

After the salty humidity of La Serena, we were in for a big change in the Atacama Desert. A night bus whisked us away from the coast and through the high plains, and when the sun rose the following morning, we were in an altogether different landscape.

The approach into the small town of San Pedro de Atacama took us through startlingly bleak terrain and we got a good preview of some of the desert areas that we would explore in the coming days. Once in town, we found a lovely spot to camp and were happy to find that some friendly German travellers that we had met on the bus ride were also setting up their tents at the same spot.

Although the town of San Pedro de Atacama is located in quite a picturesque area, it's the surrounding area that is the most exciting to explore. Since we didn't have our own vehicle to get out of town, and there is no public transport to the natural sites we wanted to see, we decided to pick a couple of organized excursions that would allow us to see the area.

At any given time, I wouldn't be surprised if there are more tourists than residents in San Pedro. Walking along the dusty main drag in town, almost every storefront offers their own version of a number of popular tours. We asked around and tried to haggle the prices a bit, and settled on first visiting the El Tatio geyser field at dawn the next morning, and then exploring the Valle de la Luna the following afternoon.

The town of San Pedro is located at 2500m, and La Serena, from where we had caught the bus to San Pedro, is located at sea level. The El Tatio geyser field is located less than 2 hours outside of San Pedro, but at an altitude of 4300m.

When our transport picked us up around 4am, we were encouraged to try and sleep until we arrived at the geyser field, so as to not feel the effects of the rapid change in altitude. Unfortunately for me, the steep, sharply twisting road kept me wide awake, and as we climbed, I began to feel worse and worse. I gave Pravin quite the rude awakening when all of a sudden I shook him from his sleep in the seat next to me and urgently directed him to get the bus driver to pull over, as I was suddenly feeling very ill. I managed to leap out of the bus before it came to a complete stop and fortunately made it to the side of the road just in time.

I wish that had been the end of things, but I ended up suffering quite badly from altitude sickness and couldn't manage to keep down any of the coca tea or sweets that the tour guide offered me at our breakfast stop, and after walking around the stunningly beautiful geyser field for about 5 minutes, I had to go curl up in the bus as I felt quite faint walking around and couldn't see straight through the intense altitude-induced headache.

Luckily, Pravin was feeling just fine and shot some beautiful photos and videos of the active geyser field. It was really quite the sight to see, as we had arrived before sunset and so in the below-zero dawn temperatures, the geysers produced huge clouds of steam that were luminous in the morning light.

After everyone had their fill of walking around the geysers, the bus took us to the next destination, a rough outdoor hot spring pool naturally filled with geothermally-heated water. Only those who weren't afraid of the freezing morning air (or those who weren't suffering from altitude sickness!) opted to get into their bathing suits and test out the waters. I made it out of the bus for a few moments to take some photos of Pravin enjoying the warm waters before having to head back and put my head between my knees.

I began to feel slightly better as we began our descent back to San Pedro, and the ride felt completely different in the light of day. We saw many, many vicuñas and llamas along the way, and even stopped for snacks in a small village where Pravin tried a llama meat skewer!

Valle de la Luna

The next afternoon, we took another tour out to the Valle de la Luna (Valley of the Moon). The terrain truly was otherworldly, with craggy brown hills giving way to massive sand dunes, and rich mineral deposits leaving a white powdery residue on most hard surfaces.

Looking down at the ground beneath our feet, at times it seemed like we were standing on an ice-rink made of clear salt crystals. Further in the distance, 6000m+ volcanic peaks were the only interruption in the otherwise perfectly clear blue skies.

We spent the afternoon exploring different areas of the Valle de la Luna, and then for sunset, we hustled it up to a viewpoint and made it just in time to see the setting sun - along with a couple hundred other people! Although our tour had been perfectly fine, we couldn't help but be slightly jealous of some other groups whose tour guides served them sunset pisco sours...

Quebrada del Diablo

The following day, we opted to do something on our own instead of taking an ($$) organized tour. We woke up bright and early and rented mountain bikes in town, and set off for a day of exploring first the Pukará de Quitor ruins, and then the Quebrada del Diablo canyon further afield. I knew the day was off to a good start when a friendly little golden retriever stray that had followed us around town in the morning decided to run alongside us as we pedalled out of town!

Although it was already quite hot and there were a couple of river crossings to contend with, the dog, whom we had nicknamed Chica, stayed right beside us as we locked up our bikes at the Pukará de Quitor archaeological site and then followed us up the trail to a beautiful mirador overlooking the valley in which San Pedro is situated. We lazed around at the top for quite a bit, admiring the views, and then joined forces with a friendly Italian traveller who was also cycling to the canyon next.

There were several more river crossings before reaching the entrance to the canyon, and some were deeper than we had anticipated! All of us ran out of speed mid-stream at least once, and our hiking boots were now squishing water with every pedal stroke. Amazingly, the little dog was still following us, and even seemed to have a bit of a laugh each time the 3 of us struggled to make it across the rivers that she swam through with absolutely zero difficulty.

Although the route was not at all signed, we had a hand-drawn map from the bike rental shop that led us to the entrance of the canyon. It was impressively beautiful, all the more so because it seemed like we were the only ones who had come to explore it that day! We wound our way along the single-track through the canyon for an hour or so until we eventually came to the end. We ventured on a bit further, but as the ground grew sandier and less rocky, we decided to turn around and find a spot for lunch. After all this, Chica still hadn't left our side! Of course, I had to treat her to part of my lunch, and we all enjoyed a nice rest in the shade before starting to head back towards town.

Once the four of us (2 Canadians + 1 Italian + 1 Chilean dog) reached San Pedro, we returned our bikes and made a beeline for the nearest ice cream shop. We ate and sampled some really unique local flavours, such as guinda, algarrobo, rica-rica, chañar, and many more. Chica stayed close by and napped right under our table, and then followed us back to our hostel and didn't leave our side for the rest of the evening!

Eventually, I did get worried that there was nothing for the dog to eat in our gated campground complex, so I had Pravin do the dirty deed of leading her outside the gate and shutting it behind her, hoping that she would be smart enough to go scrounge up some food in the streets. An hour later, I went to get something from our tent, and found the dog lying right outside the door! This time I manned up and put her out on the street myself, but as I shut the gate, she came flying over the fence a few metres away - turns out that although she was tiny, she could really leap and was determined to not leave our side!

She ended up sleeping outside our tent all night, and then after all 3 of us each had a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast and had packed up our stuff, she walked across town with us to the bus station, where she sat under my chair as we waited for our bus to show up. When it eventually arrived, she tried her best to board the bus with us, and we eventually resorted to tossing some snacks away from the bus to distract her while we climbed on. The bus took almost half an hour to finally pull out of the parking lot, and when it did, I looked back...and Chica was still sitting sadly in the middle of the lot, staring forlornly after our bus :'(