San Pedro de Atacama

I wasn’t sad to leave Antafagasta, it’s a town that has been corrupted by the wealth of the mining that surrounds it. I didn’t feel welcome or satisfied by my visit in any way. So in my opinion “the pearl of the north” has become a little dull. So it was back into the desert and heading northwest towards Calama then southwest to San Pedro De Atacama. The climb is so gradual you don’t notice it until I stoped to take the fleece off and checked the altitude. It was 3251m. There is then a steep drop down to only 2500m into the town. I had already selected a list of three Hostels to stay at and all were full!! I asked at another that didn’t look that appealing, and that was full too. It’s the trouble with travelling alone on a bike that everywhere you stop you have to carry your helmet, tank bag (with all the valuables) and dressed in all the motorbike gear in 40 degrees heat looking for reasonable priced accommodation soon becomes hard work. The next Hotel I pulled into was supposed to be $120 a night. I said that if they could do it for $100 I’d take it. So I’m in the Hotel Tulor. Which I have to say is very nice.

The next morning I elected to take a tour up to see the Tatio Geysers. Unfortunately this involves a 04.00 departure!! After we had collected a bus full we set off on a dirt road in the dark climbing fairly steeply all the way until we reached the plateau just on dawn at 4300m. Any sort of exercise at this altitude makes you breath harder and your head thump as the body cries out for what little oxygen there is. The outside temperature is either close to or below freezing which combined with the thermal activity of the geysers makes for the most spectacular spurts of hot water. This was the reason for such an early start, because as soon as the sun appears over the volcanic mountains that surround this place most of the activity stops.





The older pools are larger, but only one has a water temp of around 34c where people can swim if they want. The water in the others is around 95c, which produces clouds of steam in the cold morning air.

On the way back to town we visited a “tourist” village, which is constructed in the same adobe brick style that it would have been hundreds of years ago. Also one of the old water courses from the high mountains down into the valley where the cactus grows catching the evaporating water vapour from the stream. There has been no rain at all in this region for the last ten years, so the cactus are starting to get a little pointed at the top as the growth slows.





San Pedro de Atacama exists for the tourist trade, apart from the Hostels, Hotels and restaurants there is nothing else here. It’s a nice place though just to relax, do the tours and acclimatise a little to the altitude. The town is built of the adobe brick, which gives it a rustic feel. And for whatever reason there seems to be a lot of Rastafarians about?? Along with the packs of dogs that roam the streets, and that like to bark a lot at motorcycles. There are also a lot of backpackers, which is one of the reasons the Hostels are full. My advice is to book three to four days ahead when heading this way.

The tour for the Moon Valley starts at 16.00 when the temperature was still in the high 30’s. A short drive out of town and you turn off to have a look at the “valley of Death” first then back across the road to an amazing landscape. Apparently this was the place that NASA used to develop it’s vehicles for the moon, as it’s the closest thing on earth to the surface of the moon. The surprise of the tour is when the guide leads you into a tunnel that some people were backing out of because there was no light. The guide had a LED panel and we then proceeded into a very tight at times Lava Tube, emerging a few hundred meters later back into the sunlight with a sigh of relief. The finale is a climb up to the top of a very high sand dune to watch the sunset and the changing colours of the desert.


The Valley of the Moon


Into the Lava tube


The Amphitheatre


Climbing the Dune, hard work at 3600m!! 

Top of the dune