IV. SA Chile/W4: San Pedro de Atacama EN

Tu, 07.03. Piedras rojas
That day I had my second tour, a full day trip to the 'Piedras rojas' (Red stones).
Mauricio was again our guide and did another great job. The region is surrounded by the Coast and Andes Mountain Range and forms the driest desert in the world. It is equally the widest part of Chile with volcanoes of an altitude up to 6.000m. But with Chachacoma and Ojas de Mata I was well prepared against the altitude sickness ;)
The salt here cannot be used to be eaten as it contains minerals. However, lithium and 25% of the world's copper needs are extracted here. As everywhere in SPA and its surroundings there are no sealed roads so it was again a pretty bumpy rollercoaster ride including a free massage :P
Our first stop was 'Laguna Chaxa', a beautiful lagoon where you could see many flamencos. They can usually reach 70y but some here had even 90y of age. They breed only 2eggs once per year and with the heavy rains this year a lot of eggs were flooded away so that there were only 20-40 i/o 200 left. Btw, flamingos are born with a white colour and only turn pink after 6 months due to the betacaroteen which can be found in the shrimps they are eating 14-16h a day.
Unfortunately, our bus had a tyre issue so that we lost an hour waiting for a new bus to arrive. But that didn't bother us that much, gave us more time to watch the flamingos and again, better be safe than sorry :)
With the new bus we then drove through 'Salar Atacama', now already at an altitude of 3.000m and which was part of the Inka Trail that actually goes all the way from Ecuador to Argentina. We also saw a lot of agricultural terraces cultivating quinoa, sweetcorn and green beans before enjoying a tasty breakfast including scrambled eggs and mata tea in Socaire.
Socaire is a town with one of the most earthquakes in Chile. It also has the 2nd oldest church rebuilt of red stone cold lava and a cacteen roof in 2010. The Cardon cacteen grows only 1cm per year and the one we saw was about 300y old which also explains why they are nowadays heavily protected.
We also saw a lot of wildlife such as lamas, alpavas, lamb and goats and after passing the small town Toconao and its canyon also many trees including even Eucalyptus ones.
The 'Piedras rojas' were the highest point at about 4.500m. It is an open field with a lot of winds but spectacular scenery that I found really hard to describe - my absolute highlight in Chile so far, just look at the pictures :) At this point our chips bags and some fizzy drink bottles inflated which is the same effect happening to our heart, lung and brain. I was fine but some people could feel the pressure with headaches (better with chachacoma) or had oxygen problems (better with mata tea).
We then went to the 'Lagunas Altiplanicas Miñiques and Miscanti' at 3.000m with Miscanti being 10x bigger and both surrounded by 5.900m high volcanoes. There were again many flamencos, birds, alpavas in a really nice scenery.
For lunch we then enjoyed a really yummy veg soup and then a Peruan chicken dish with salad, rice and quinoa omelette before our driver showed us how the bus can drive automatically in neutral gear based on the magnetic points and volcanic activities.
The last stop was then at the Tropic of Carnicorn which I also crossed in Africa 4 months ago. It is one of the earth's 5 horizontal lines (aquator, arctic, antarctic, cancer and tropical) and which is also part of the Inka Trail. Here we could equally feel the real heat of the desert and got some last views of Volcanoe Laska and Atacama salt flat before heading back to SPA.

We, 08.03.2016 Geysirs & Valle de la Luna
That day I had two more tours; usually I don't book that many touristy tours as they are quite expensive - but with Woofing and Couchsurfing I saved some money the last days and could also get some tours at a more favourable price.
With quite an early start at 4am and again a good sky full of stars we first went to the geysers, especially the famous 'Gyser El Tatio'. Typical for these regions, the temperature was only about 1* so definitively pretty chilly. It is the highest termal field in the world and the erupting water is about 86-96*. There was also the common smell of rotten eggs. Geysers work 24h but can best be seen in the cold mornings, similar to our breathing. They can erupt any time and the different colours come from the minerals with sulphur being yellow, thermal bacteria being orange and salt being black.
As we were again quite high with 4.300m altitude for 5h everything and also our 30min hike along the Geysers was done in slow motion; no running, jumping or too much exercise. Alcohol and partying the day before is also not the best idea to avoid altitude sickness. There was also the possibility to bath in a 30* thermal pool but with an outside temperature of only 1* that wasn't appealing enough for me :O
On our way we passed the active volcanoe Putanoe before we saw an incredibly beautiful and green wetland with a lot of animals such as vicunas, flamencos and lamas. That being said we visited Machuca, a 150 people village with currently only 8 habitants mainly living there to prepare empanadas and lama meat for the tourists. I also tried it and was positively surprised, it tasted quite nice but was with 3.000p quite expensive. Btw, when a lama female dies the man immediately stops eating and dies out of sorrow; vice versa when the male dies the female instantly finds a new male :P
Fyi, the Atacama salt flat is the 3rd biggest in the world - with the 2nd biggest being in Argentina and the largest for sure the Uyuni salt flat in Bolivia which I will see in a couple of days ;)

In the evening around 4pm I went to 'Valle de la Luna', after Piedras rojas my 2nd favourite place. The scenery is insane, you really get the feeling of being on another planet and some parts reminded me of sweet baked cupcakes - but just look at the pictures, it is again hard to describe :)
This desert only has a humidity of 18% (in comparison, the Sahara desert has about 25%) so without water you would die even faster, after roughly 18h. On our drive through the valley we visited the 3 Marys and the Amphitheatre - great rock formations that can only be found here. We then had a long hike to the 'Great View' which was actually more than great but breathtaking: salt capped mountain ranges, volcanoes, sand dunes, Amphitheatre from the distance - just unbelievable ;)
The last highlight was 'Mirador Coyote' where we went to see a spectacular sunset - again, pics say more than thousand words and not even with the best cameras these feelings can be captured; you just need to enjoy it :)))

Th, 09.03. San Pedro de Atacama
After 3 days touri program I enjoyed a really relaxed nice last day in SPA.
That meant sleeping longer (until 8 or 9), doing some washing (which thanks to desert temperatures was already dry after 2h) and organising, i.e. booking my 3d/2n trip to the Salt Flats in Uyuni, Bolivia (the tours are generally cheaper if directly booked in Uyuni; however the bus ride from SPA to Uyuni is already about 25€, you need a hostel of min 15€ plus the tour itself from Uyuni is 90€ and as I got the SPA tour again cheaper the first mentioned option would have even been dearer for me; thanks a lot to Mauricio here, you are really amazing :)).
For lunch and to thank Mauricio for his great hospitality and help, we both enjoyed a pretty yummy chicken in a nice small restaurant with backyard garden and a cool place to relax and digest the food.
Afterwards I went to the 'Feria artesanal', the local craft market to buy oja de mata and chachacoma as my further travel will be in even higher altitude. I also bought 6l of water and 2 toilet rolls which is always needed to use the toilets (for which you also have to pay up to 1-6 Bolivianos, around 14-86cts).

All in all I really loved Chile - it is a super narrow but incredibly diverse country and I have only seen the north so far.
The only disadvantage is that it is a relatively expensive country comparable to Central European states such as Germany and France and that you have to pay for toilets and WiFi. That is also the reason why I decided to travel south in a couple of years when I have more money and to then combine it with the even more expensive southern Argentina and the super expensive Antarctica - places I can only enjoy with more money :)
Moreover, I really met super nice people here, the country is relatively safe - a lot of reasons to come back ;)

Concerning finances, I did quite well thanks to Nadi's contacts, my contacts, Couchsurfing and Woofing
- in total, I only paid for and spent 3 nights in a hostel right at the beginning in Santiago and had my main expenses in transport and the 4 tours in SPA.
I thus indeed only spent 221€, i.e. 8,80€/d in 3,5w/24d in Chile below my budget of 33€/d - saved money that I could then spent for the expensive tour to Uyuni (145€ for 3d = 48,30€/d and 15€ above budget plus 15€ shopping for hat, gloves and sweater to survive in the incredible cold) :P

Fr, 10.03. - Su, 12.03. San Pedro de Atacama, Chile - Uyuni, Bolivia
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