San Pedro de Atacama

On Thursday (June 23rd) we took a two hour flight north to Calama, followed by a one-hour shuttle ride (photo above taken en-route) to our destination for five nights - San Pedro de Atacama. It is a hard place to describe but hopefully the photos will augment the words and you will be able to get a sense of what it is like.

The Atacama desert region of Chile is one of the driest places on the planet.  It stretches for 600 miles and covers the width of the country-from the coast up into the Andes. Because of the lack of rain (many areas haven´t recorded rain for hundreds of years) plant and animal life are very limited.  The only industry in the area is mining, primarily copper.  The altitude and dry climate also provide the perfect conditions for studying the cosmos and astrobiology with numerous observatories and research centers hidden away in the Andes. This is the area on earth that is viewed by scientists as most similar to Mars - the extreme dryness and the soil chemistry - so NASA is using it as a Mars-like laboratory where they can study the limits of life and test drilling and life-detection technologies that might be sent to Mars in the future.

So that gives you some general context to the place!

San Pedro is clearly the northern part of the country's most popular tourist destination. Even in the middle of winter the small village is packed with tourists interested in outdoor adventure. Located at an elevation of about 8,000 feet, it is a small oasis of clay colored adobe houses, shops, restaurants, hotels and hostels, and dirt streets. About every third door opens onto a tourist agency that books tours and excursions to all of the sights the area has to offer. It is located between the Salt mountains and Domeyko mountains to the west and the Andes to the east, and on the edge of Salar de Atacama, the world's third largest salt flat. The influence of the indigenous people and culture seems very integrated in spite of it being a tourist location.

This place made us feel both young and old. Young because we were doing all these outdoor activities with college kids or recent graduates traveling before they start their careers or advanced degrees. But we felt old for the same reason!  Most of the travelers we spoke with (not many from the US, but some who did speak English) had started out trekking in Peru and Bolivia and were now enjoying the luxury of hot showers and good food.

After checking in to our hotel - La Casa de Don Tomas 

we headed off just a few blocks to the main street of the town to find a place to eat for dinner.

Walking on the narrow dusty street we were skeptical, but we poked our heads into one of the first restaurants we spotted and both the decor and the menu had us sold. These tiny store fronts open up into large restaurants with both interior and courtyard seating. 

The food was fabulous and very reasonable. It began five days of great meals.

And even some musical entertainment in the restaurants and on the streets.

The next task was to form our plan of attack for our day trips. After walking into a few agencies we found one that was advertising an Astronomical tour which we knew we wanted to do, so we ended up working with Sebastian at Ivero travels. We mapped out a plan, which he later helped us tweak as some unexpected cold weather made changes necessary. The main strategy was to start low (as if 8.000 ft is low) and save the highest trip into the Andes for the end, when we would be better adjusted to the altitude.

In the next few posts we will share each of these adventures, but wanted to focus here on the town of San Pedro de Atacama.

For starters, a cup of cocaine in the morning.  Well, actually the leaves of the coca plant in a tea bag. Legal here, but not permissible to bring back home to the fussy USA.  It is recommended to ease the adjustment to the altitude. We were doing fine with the altitude, but why not...

As mentioned earlier, the main streets in the center of town are dirt and basically pedestrian only. Shopkeepers throughout the day are seen sweeping the entryways, but it is a futile process.

We had our own battles with the dirt, sand, salt.  By the end of the first day we  understood why the hotel made available a daily supply of disposable shoe cleaning cloths.

Deliveries to the stores and restaurants are done on these bikes

Below is just a sampling of the shop exteriors with the primary items being ceramics and textiles. In addition to the MANY tour companies and restaurants there were also several shops selling the needed gear and clothing.  While temperatures could be up into the 60s and 70s, the evenings as well as the higher elevations could be well below zero.  While I had come pretty well equipped, Jim (always one to love clothes shopping) picked up a much needed hat and some warm gloves.

Appreciated this mix of old and modern as this young guy rode by on his horse - be sure to take note of his ear buds/iPod.

In the town square is the San Pedro de Atacama Church, an adobe structure that dates back to the 1600s.

Also on the square, we happened upon a performance by the local elementary school.  It was the start of a multi-day celebration for San Pablo, and was honoring the indigenous cultures with costume, song and dance.

 They could not have been more adorable and excited.

We were also in town for the other BIG event - the Final game of the Copa America, with Chile playing against Argentina, an intense ongoing rivalry.

Every bar and restaurant offered the opportunity to watch, including the place we had selected for dinner.  It was a late game, starting at 8:00 p.m. and we had an early start the next morning for a tour up into the Andes, so we just stayed to enjoy the crowd standing and singing the Chile National Anthem, and cheering as the game began.  While there would be enough interest in the game anyway, it was even more so as one of our tour guides explained because one of the star players on the national team, Alexis Sanchez, is from Tocopilla (west of Calama, on the coast) which is considered a local town being a part of the Antofagasta Region of Chile.  Later we were awakened with the proof that Chile had won the title - cheering, firecrackers, and car horns blaring. 

Considered the oasis in this plateau desert, there were trees and other vegetation.  The two indigenous trees are the Algorobo (Carob) tree and the Chanar tree, which produces fruit used medicinally for cough medicine.  The carob pods and dried fruits are often displayed as a kind of local potpourri.

There you have it!  Welcome to San Pedro de Atacama!