„Dar la Vida“ in San Pedro de Atacama

Ipapashiwe: 16.01.2020

(Free translation) "Frieda, it's a shame that we only met recently and spent so little time together." "Yes, you're right, Felipe, but you can come with me to Easter Island ;)" So I went to Rapa Nui and received this message from Felipe: "So I booked a flight ticket to the Atacama Desert and will accompany you for the first 4 days". Okay, my Chilean brother is a little bit "loco", but hey, traveling together is always more fun and I think it's nice that we get to see each other again before I fly back to Germany.

On the night before the flight (which is supposed to be at 6 in the morning), we realize that we didn't book the same flight. There are three or four domestic Chilean airlines, and on average, there are about 2-3 airplanes flying from Santiago to Calamar per hour. His flight was 15 minutes earlier. One of Felipe's friends drove us to the airport, but we were "a little" late, even though I had already urged to set the alarm clock half an hour earlier. To be precise, we were so late that Felipe couldn't check in his luggage and I only made it to my airplane by rushing. So I flew ahead and Felipe tried to catch the next flight. "Chilean Way" doesn't always work, so we'll try "German punctuality" next time.

Afterwards, everything went well and he arrived in San Pedro de Atacama 4 hours after me. This town has about 6,000 inhabitants and is located in the middle of the Atacama Desert, which makes it a perfect starting point for excursions. The Atacama Desert is the driest and highest desert in the world. It extends from southern Peru through the north of Chile to the west of Bolivia.

I have to be honest, I'm not the type of person who looks at a thousand pictures on the internet before visiting a travel destination. I've only heard from everyone that it's worth going there and the landscape is unique. But seriously, what can you see for 8 days in a "waterless landscape"? Rock formations, sand dunes?

However, when I arrived, I was overwhelmed by a flood of tourist agencies and excursion offers. There seem to be a lot of lagoons, geysers, canyons, animals, and plants to see here and the place seems to consist only of vacation accommodations. Because Felipe only has 4 days in San Pedro and we want to see a lot, we decide to fill our days completely with excursions and start in the afternoon. But that also means getting up around 5 o'clock every day and coming back around 9 o'clock in the evening. Quite exhausting. In Chile, when you get the best out of something, no matter the topic, you say that you give your life for it. "Dar la Vida". That's exactly what we did in San Pedro, I felt like I saw the sunrise and sunset for 7 days in a row. But it was really worth it!

Our first destination in the afternoon was the "Valle de La Luna", a hyper-arid valley with various rock formations where you can observe a spectacular sunset. Here, the desert really looks like you would expect! No plants to see on the ground and the temperatures range from 5 degrees at night to 40 degrees during the day. You also need to get used to the altitude of 2,500 meters, even a short hike to a dune becomes a "breathtaking" experience. The sunset was also very beautiful, with a view of the volcano "Lincancancabur", where a beautiful full moon was rising.