trip within a trip pt. 6: San Pedro de Atacama

After Caldera/ Bahia Inglesa beachness we headed North to the big city Antofogasta (Total Bus Time: 29 hours) but didnt stop and headed Northeast to Calama (TBT=32 hours) where we connected to another bus going east to San Pedro De Atacama (TBT= 34 hours). This is a small town very near the Bolivian border and it is basically overrun by tourists. All it is hostals, restaurants, and tourist agencies. The Adobe Disneyland. The receive people come here is for the spectacular nature. First, the Valle de Luna (valley of the moon, duh), a beautiful valley with salt flats, peaks, desserts, incredible mountains, sandboarding. We went on a tour that ended with everyone hiking up a large mountain to stand on a peak and watch the sunset. Absolutely breathtaking, the entire sky slowly changes color from blue to a deep purple, to bright orange and pinks and you can see for miles. It was full of tourists from all over the world, but at sunset it was absolute silence. Words are so meaningless in the presence of beauty this overwhelming, or as I register it in my mind, the overwhelming presence of God. I took pictures of course, but there's no way they can suggest what it feels like to be there at sundown.

The next morning we got up early and we out to San Pedro's other main site: the Tatio Geysers. These were very impressive as well. It was very high up (fun fact: highest altitude where natural hot springs/ geysers exist in the world) and I got a bit of altitude sickness and didn't go swimming in the hot springs, though it looked like fun. There's no Chile-California comparison to made here that I know of. I'll just say Wow...