Cerros La Punta Chica

Atacama Desert: Red Rocks and Salt Flats

This is a combination of my last two days’ tours on January 14 and 15, with photos so you can see the desert scenery. More explanations are given in the photo captions.

Most of the area is up near the Bolivian border. In fact, in the salt flats tour, our guide was actually an English and Spanish teacher from La Paz, Bolivia. A few times we were above 4500 meters (14,700 feet) altitude! When I breathed, I couldn’t feel any result of being oxygenated. This resulted in my walking slowly and not talking to anyone— to try to get my breath back!

On the last day, I shared the tour with the Bolivian guide, a doctor from Santiago specializing in geriatrics, and a retired Taiwanese chemical engineer. The four of us bonded immediately, and enjoyed each others’ company the whole day. A jackpot!

And this concludes my trip to northern Chile.Read more