San Pedro de Atacama

Clare, Alejandro, and I got to San Pedro de Atacama after a ridiclous journey, and I fell in love with the place.  It's a tiny town in the middle of the Atacama Desert--the driest desert in the world--with like 6 streets.  It´s so chilled out there and mellow and we really lucked out with our hostel.  We had originally been bummed out as it did not seem like what we wanted when we booked it online (all the others had been fully booked), but it ended up making our stay there amazing.  Nico was the guy who ran the place and he was super chill and we befriended him when we first got there.  He told us about where the good new years party was going to be, and knew all the best places in San Pedro that were muy tranquilidad.

 

Just the casual view of an active volcanoe from our hostel.

New years started with a party at the hostel and then we went to a restaurant that had been converted into a bar for the night called La Casona (other than 2 days a year, bars are illegal in San Pedro).  I guess the Chileans had some pent up party energy, because when we left, exhausted, at like 4am, the party was still going strong.  Also. at out hostel and all over the town, people had built scarecrows and then set them on fire at midnight...so fun!

Happy New Years!

The following day Nico and his friend Jorge invited us to come swimming at a pool just outside town.  It was so unsafe, with people doing backflips off the side, pushing each other in, and babies in waterwings in the deep end!!  Barely anyone knew how to properly swim, and I was flipping my shit.  But no DNSs, surprisingly.  That night after we went to dinner, Nico brought Clare and me to the hostel Jorge works at and they made a bonfire, and we could look at the stars and it was really cool (y muy tranquilidad--Nico's fav phrase).  Almost perfect silence...except for the roves of street dogs who would occasionally start yelping.

Alejandro left to go back to Argentina the the following morning, and as per Nico's suggestion, Clare and I rented bikes and rode into the desert.  We went to Rio San Pedro, but there was literally just a trickle of water as the river had dried up.  We were a little disappointed at not being able to swim, but the scenery was still breathtaking.  I had no idea that a desert could have such beautiful and varied landscapes.

 

Valle de la Luna (named because it's surface resembles the moon)

The next day was Clare's last, and after chilling out in the day, we went on a tour of Valle de la Luna, which was otherworldly.  We watched the sunset from the Valle de la Muerte, and casually climbed through these salt caves that the indigenous people had hidden in during European invasions.  Clare left the following morning for Salta which was sad, but I had a really chilled out day.  Some of the boys from the hostel were driving to the pool, so I went with them again, and then hung out in the courtyard of the hostel until my bus left that evening for La Serena.  San Pedro was so great, I didn't want to leave!  Definitely going back there (although the lack of water was a little worrisome...half the time we felt like we were in 127 hours rationing our water off).  Love this town so much!

 

Clare and I at the sunset in Valle de la Muerte