Going to the Moon

We started the day excited to visit the Valley of the Moon, a quick 30 minute drive from San Pedro. After the rangers at the entrance explained the walking spots to us, we set off, driving up a sandy road surrounded by red cliffs, covered in white salt crystals.
The first walk was near the Duna Grande (big dune) and took us about an hour. It ran on top of a rocky ridge, with cliffs on either side, similar to the valley of Mars, but with white salt desposits crystallised on the rock. The big dune sealed off the valley, and it was indeed huge. I tried to include Nick in some of the photos to give a sense of perspective - as the landscapes were not only breathtaking, but also really vast.
With only a lonely bush clinging to life at the bottom of the dune, this desolate lanscape is so harsh that NASA tested a mars rover here, to see if the vehicle could traverse the rocks and sand that indeed felt like they belonged on a different planet.
We drove deeper into the Valle de la Luna, keeping the giant dune on our left and arrived at our second stop, the amphitheatre. Unlike the one we visited in Cochamó, this amphitheatre was made of layered red rocks, and the path took us along it's edge.
As we drove beyond the amphitheatre, the salt desposits started becoming much more visible as we entered an old salt extraction site. Littered with old, rusty machinery and covered in sharp salt crystals, we wandered around inspecting the various rocks. We finished the tour at the Three Marys, three towering rock formations that had survived erosion.
We really enjoyed all the stops, they all felt very alien and unlike anything we'd seen before. It was pleasantly hot, around 25 degrees and sunny. Luckily for us, most tours go in the afternoon so we barely saw anyone.
After a quick and delicious lunch in town at a place called Franchuteria which made great baguettes (where we ended up going pretty much every day!), we headed out again for more adventures. We drove to Laguna Baltinache, a collection of 8 small salt ponds in the middle of a gigantic plain called the Plain of Patience.
In order to reach Baltinache we had to drive along a very long dirt road. We've had our fair share of bad roads on this trip, but this one ended up being the hardest so far. It didn't have particularly big pot holes but, on top of being over 30km long, it had constant ripples, big enough to shake our SUV.
We quickly realised we were either going to have to drive really slow, or really fast. Inspired by the local minibuses, we opted for driving at 90 kmph! In order to avoid drifting through some of the deeper gravel, I had to hold onto the steering wheel so hard that it was dripping in sweat once we arrived. Even though it sounds a bit crazy, the road was straight and very wide and essentially empty. Also, thankfully driving at that speed reduced the shaking a lot, making the journey much more bearable.
Once we arrived (alive!) to the lagunas, we took a walk around some of the smaller ones, enjoying the crazy scenery. Some lagunas had very intense blue colours, and the salt around them created the most fascinating patterns and crystals.
You could even go for a dip in the biggest one! It's so salty that you float, similar to the dead sea. The swim was much colder than expected (as Nick's expression shows!) but, once acclimatised, we really enjoyed floating under the sun. We dried off, brushing the salt of our skin, and headed back to San Pedro along the awful road.
After a very packed day, we finished on a high note, watching the sunset in the Valle de la Luna. The entry ticket we had from the morning allowed us to go back at 5:30pm and enjoy another amazing sunset with a beautiful yellow to red colour transition. There was even some lightning striking the mountains on horizon from some very ominous looking clouds. What an incredible place!Read more