ATACAMA DESERT

After the salt flats tour finished, it didn't take long to reach the dusty desert Chilean town of San Pedro de Atacama. Stamping in and out was super quick and it was a little heartbreaking to see so clearly the different fortunes of the two countries; at the border the dirt road in Bolivia turned into a tarmaced one in Chile.

Back into Chile meant back into Chile PRICES and finding a cheap hostel proved very tricky. We settled on Kañas, at the far end of town in a dormitory room sharing with our buddies Sarah and Frank.

Being out in the desert hundreds of miles from any big cities meant the night sky's are super clear. In fact the thin air and lack of light pollution has given birth to ALMA. The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array is an international partnership of scientists from Europe, the U.S, Japan, Canada, Taiwan, and the Republic of Korea, in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. It's the largest astronomical project in existence comprising of a single 'telescope' of revolutionary design, composed of 66 high precision antennas located on the Chajnantor plateau at 5000 meters altitude in northern Chile. You can arrange a tour of the ALMA facility on weekends. Unfortunately for us it was too late for us, but for more info click HERE. Instead we booked a star gazing tour for the night in a local couples back garden (Starting at 11pm). Unlike ALMA's 66 precision antennas we were promised four telescopes and free wine.

The star gazing tour with 'Una Noche Con Las Estrellas' was brilliant, run by a Chilean astronomer and his wife. There was a quick explanation at the beginning where she pointed out to us some of the constellations using a really strong laser pen (you know, the kind that are banned in the U.K.). The astronomers wife was a bit trigger happy causing a few guests to quickly move their heads from blocking her view of Orion's Belt or face loosing their vision. The sky is completely different between the two hemispheres except for a strip along the equator where everything we recognised was upside down. We were also shown how to find the South Pole using the southern cross. It was quite complicated compared to our simple north star. It was now roughly midnight and we warmed up with a cup of hot chocolate, then it was time for the proper show, looking through the four exceedingly strong telescopes. We saw many different groups of stars that couldn't be seen with the naked eye. And then we looked at Jupiter and saw 4 of its 60+ moons. Then the star act (get it) THE MOON! It was absolutely incredible, we could see the dark patches and even the craters. It was amazing!!! One of the astronomers took a photo through the telescope on Frank's phone and it came out really well. The last photo below was taken by moonlight.

The next day we went on a tour to see The Valley of the Moon. The guide was super knowledgeable and had really cool sunglasses. First we went to the Death Valley which was originally called The Valley of Mars but was misheard as 'Muerte' (The Spanish word for death). It's famous for its bright red jagged rocks and strata striped cliffs. We stood on the cliffs looking at the mountainous skyline that marked the border with Bolivia.

We drove across the clifftops to another valley called Valley De La Luna (Valley of the moon) it had a similar topography to the Mars / Death Valley except this one was covered in a bright layer of white salt.

We drove down into the valley through a surreal landscape of reflective shiny bits of salt. At the end we were greeted to some odd wind sculpted rock formations called the three Mary's. They would have started life as small rocky hills, but over time the weaker rock has been literately blown away leaving these eccentric sculptures. Our guide said it only rains seven or eight times a year here, making it one of the most inhospitable places on Earth. In fact this park is famous for its lack of life. Apparently NASA picked this destination to trial the Mars Rover. We continued our journey through a massive section of the valley called the amphitheater, surrounded by giant sand-dunes, glowing cliffs and the majestic Cordilleras rising up in the background.

After exploring more of the valleys nooks and crannys we climbed up to a massive sand dune to watch the setting sun turn the distant Cordillias pink.

Back in town we grabbed our stuff and ran to catch the 9.30pm bus out of town to Arica on the Chile/Peru border. After a long old bus journey we awoke in Arica and quickly realised we knew nothing about this place. It was gearing up for carnival but nowhere could tell us about surfing in the area. Not the tourist information, nor the surf hostel... we decided to chance it and took a bus to the beach area where accommodation options were even more limited and expensive. Luckily, Will got chatting to a surf rental guy on the beach and he had a mate who rented rooms in his house (although it looked like a hostel to us). It turns out he was a surf coach and had guided the pro tour when they came to Arica to surf El Gringo, a dangerous wave that breaks onto sharp shallow rock in town. His place was up on the hillside overlooking Chinchorro beach. The surf on the beach wasn't the best however the sunsets form the roof terrace were incredible.

Unfortunately for Will, this guy was a bit of a douchebag - he didn't listen when Will was asking for surf advice, instead telling him to go to the point outside his house which was a one foot wave suitable for beginners or long-boarders. Will continually asked where he could surf that would have shoulder to head high waves and got no help from anyone there. They even went surfing one night and the following at another beach, then came back and told Will about it saying he should have come - but they hadn't invited him or told him where to go so he could take a taxi. It was frustrating for us both and we decided to leave. The surf hostel in town was no better, with someone on the desk who knew nothing about the surf spots. They also advertised surfboard rental but didn't have boards located there, only at the beach which was no good for the point break in town. We were glad to leave to be honest and we were annoyed to have wasted three days there without Will catching one decent wave. I on the other hand caught my first proper green wave on a whopping nine foot longboard and had the ride of my life! Not to mention the many turtles we saw popping up for air in the surf.

We took a drastic decision to leave Arica, miss out Arequipa in Peru and head straight to Lobitos, near the Peru/Ecuador border. This would mean crossing the Chile/Peru border and then taking two consecutive 20ish hour buses. After this our plan was to slowly head down the coast surfing, before flying from Lima to Iquitos in the Peruvian Amazon jungle and hopefully taking a boat down the Amazon to get into Colombia.