Day #3 on the road to Santiago

We were up and packed away while it was still dark this morning. The sound of the waves crashing onto the beach had kept me awake for most of the night. We had breakfast and were back on the coast road heading south by 7am.

We drove past some beautiful white sandy beaches and rocky coves within the national park before reaching the industrial port of Chanaral. It's bleak appearance was exaggerated by the dark, cloudy skies. Despite attempts to brighten the place up, and some meagre facilities, it didn’t look like a place you would want to come on holiday!

Further along the coast, we drove past lots of ramshackle settlements with wooden shacks, many of them built on stilts, tents, and other temporary structures. It was difficult to tell whether these were holiday accommodation or permanent homes. Either way, there appears to be very little in the way of building regulations within the national park.

Later, the sun came out and we were back to driving through stony, featureless desert.

We diverted inland to stick to the main road. We stopped in the town of Vallenar to have a truck lunch made up of the leftovers from yesterday and the day before. I bought some delicious cherries from a nearby shop, and we both had an ice cream, seeing as my blood sugar has been on the lower side of normal for the past couple of days!

We drove on through the afternoon.

At the town of La Serena, we stopped at a supermarket for the cook group to buy ingredients for dinner, and for the rest of us to get whatever we needed. It was a huge, incredibly busy hypermarket, so Ritchie's instruction to 'be quick' was not that easy to comply with!

After the stop, we drove for another hour to reach our campsite. El Oasis campground was in a lovely location just behind the beach. We didn’t get there until after 6.30pm, though, so we didn't have much time to do anything. We picked a pitch and got sorted out and then it wasn’t long before dinner was ready - chicken and vegetable pasta. Then it was bed - another early start tomorrow!Læs mere