The driest place on Earth! - San Pedro de Atacama

03/01 - 06/01

High Noon, cloudless sky, and the sun burning at full strength at 2,400 meters above sea level in the Atacama Desert. And we were like, 'Hey, let's ride for 5 hours through the scorching hot desert, even though we've never been on a horse before!' Yes, you read that right - we went all cowboy/girl, or at least it felt a little bit like that. I don't want to imagine what it actually looked like....

For our first horseback riding experience, we couldn't think of a better place than the driest place on Earth - the Atacama Desert - in northern Chile. Despite taking a flight, the journey from Valparaíso turned out to be quite long and exhausting - we needed a total of five different modes of transportation (Uber/bus/Uber/flight/bus) before we could finally check into the hostel in San Pedro de Atacama late in the evening.

The next day, we explored the town at a leisurely pace and considered what we wanted to do here. Needless to say, there was no shortage of options. Along the main street of San Pedro, countless agencies offer various activities in and around the desert. It's not easy to decide on the right one - additional research on the internet proved to be helpful.

Not far from San Pedro is the 'Valle de la Luna' (Valley of the Moon). The landscape resembles that of the moon, which is why it is named as such. At first, we wanted to explore the Moon Valley on our own by bike, but due to the long distances and scorching heat, we wisely opted for a guided tour in an air-conditioned minivan. We knew that we would be among a mass of tourists again, but given the circumstances, we accepted it.

First, we were led through a rather uninteresting salt cave, where most of the time we just stood in line and watched the Chinese guy in front of us take continuous photos. Then we drove to the actual attraction, the vast Moon Valley. After walking for a while, we reached the top of a mountain and could enjoy the surrounding landscape. Although I didn't feel like I was on the moon, the giant sand dune and rock formations were quite impressive.

Even though we didn't stay in the sun for long, both of us had applied SPF 50+ sunscreen and wore headgear, I managed to get a terrible sunburn on my lips. That's the power of the sun in the Atacama....

At the end of the tour, we watched the sunset in the Coyote Valley. Unfortunately, the sun didn't paint the valley in colorful hues as the tour guide had promised, but the atmosphere was still very impressive!

On the same day, we booked a stargazing tour for the night. Nowhere else in the world has such a clear view of the night sky as in the Atacama. At 10 PM, we ventured out into the desert and were welcomed in the darkness by a Canadian who provided a very informative and entertaining explanation of the night sky using a laser pointer. The sky looked breathtaking and showed a slightly different image than the one in Austria. Since we are in the southern hemisphere, instead of the North Star, you can see the Southern Cross and two bright nebulae, which are actually separate galaxies outside of our Milky Way. I had high expectations for the 11 telescopes (including the largest in all of South America) through which we could take turns looking, but unfortunately, we could hardly see anything. I thought that by looking through a telescope, I would see glowing planets and stars - admittedly, I once again fell victim to my naivety...

Since we didn't find the telescopes particularly enjoyable and we had already gone through all of them, I tried my hand at Milky Way photography. Due to nervousness and possibly the time of day, I made completely wrong settings on the camera, resulting in a black image. Fortunately, the astronomer who was guiding the Spanish group through the night came to my aid and set everything up correctly. On the third attempt, we managed to take a photo together, but there was no satisfaction - I definitely need to practice astrophotography! :)

At some point in New Zealand, I had the idea of wanting to ride a horse along the beach. Unfortunately, a suitable opportunity never arose - in San Pedro, I finally had my first horseback riding experience. It wasn't the cheesy beach ride, but rather a very authentic desert ride. While strolling through San Pedro, we discovered a horse riding agency and, out of excitement, immediately booked the longest option - a five-hour tour. I think Luki was glad to no longer have to endure my complaining about it and agreed to it despite the relatively high price. 

The next morning, we were picked up by a gaucho straight out of a storybook. At his ranch, we were given our equipment and assigned horses. Since the gaucho didn't speak English, the young German volunteer (unfortunately, I forgot her name) translated what we were supposed to do. She also mentioned that as complete beginners, a half-day tour through the Atacama might be a bit too much for us - well, someone should have told us that beforehand....

The ride first took us through the Catarpe Valley. This valley is home to the San Pedro River, which allows for a partially green landscape. We rode in the shallow river, where unfortunately, a lot of mosquitoes annoyed us and the horses. We also got a few bites and were relieved when we changed the scenery. From the Catarpe Valley, we climbed a very steep and narrow path up a mountain, where we had a fantastic view of the entire valley.

After a short break for drinks and rest, we continued the tour towards Valle de la Muerte (Death Valley). Along a mountain ridge, we soon reached the huge sand dune that we had to go down. The gaucho asked us if we wanted to ride down or go on foot. What he was actually trying to tell us with his question was, 'Hey, you greenhorns, please go on foot. I really don't feel like picking you and the horses up from the sand!' Since we didn't have the horses under control anyway, it seemed reasonable to us and we quickly decided to walk. So we followed the gaucho and the three horses down the sand slope. Afterwards, we rode through Death Valley for quite a long time, which reminded us of scenes from a Western movie and gave us a cowboy feeling. The sun was high at that point, and we were completely at its mercy.

At 2 PM, we safely arrived back at the ranch - of course, our legs and butts were quite sore, but we were far from the announced exhaustion. We spent the rest of the day relaxed in the hostel and treated ourselves to a delicious dinner.

Conclusion:

San Pedro de Atacama is purely a tourist spot. If all the tourists were removed, the place would be pretty much empty - there would probably be more street dogs than people there! The flood of travel agencies can be overwhelming at first, especially since they all offer almost the same things and there are no indicators of how to recognize a good tour provider. Without additional internet research or recommendations from other travelers, you can quickly find yourself at a loss...

The activities we did were all exciting, albeit quite expensive. Once again, we spent a lot of money in a short amount of time, but looking back, it was worth it. Personally, I enjoyed the horseback ride the most, although we realized that riding is probably even more fun when you can do more than just trot slowly but also cover longer stretches at a canter or gallop. The gaucho showed us the commands to make the horses trot, but we didn't feel very comfortable when our two horses started trotting and seemed to want to race. Fortunately, they always responded to the stop command! :)

Luki became fascinated by the universe after the stargazing tour and resolved to learn more about astronomy... let's see how long this interest lasts! :)

Hasta pronto!

E&L

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