Valle del Arcoiris, Atacama

The Valle del Arcoiris, also called rainbow valley in english, was an astonishing place we visited on a half-day tour from San Pedro.
Our first stop, however, was at the Yerbas Buenas petroglyphs: A place where pre-hispanic petroglyphs (‚rock art‘) from the Atacameno people, dating back approx. 10‘000 years, are almost perfectly conserved! And - of course - the main motive is the Lama 😄 Very interesting place which was followed by an unexpectedly good breakfast with fresh baguette, fresh avocado mash and even fresh scrambled eggs 🤤 We decided at this point already that the tour has absolutely been worth it! 😉
Fully nourished we went on to the actual destination: The rainbow valley. You‘ll easily see why it got its name when looking at the pictures, but let us tell you a bit about the place:
The colours in the earth if the Doneyko mountains around the valley come from the different minerals which are highly abundant in many regions of the Atacama desert: copper oxides (green-ish), gold (golden, hehe), silver (you guess it) and iron (dark brown to black), gypsum and salt (both white) and many silicate crystals which were clear as glass sometimes!😳. The best thing about it: Even though the Chilean Industry really wants to harvest the precious minerals for a long time already, the locals do not allow it - and it seems to work 💪🏼 Luckily, as according to our (super lovely and fun!) guide, this place is even older than the Andes!! So good to see for once that a place like this is not exploited for profit ❤️
We had a good time strolling around the colourful mountains, being pointed out the different minerals on the way and taking LOTS of photos 🙈 before going back to San Pedro for some freetime and a lunch break, preparing for the second half of our day: Another tour into the Atacama desert.Read more