Greetings from Lima, Peru! It’s a late one tonight, folks. If you’re up still, you should probably go to bed. If you just woke up, go say “hi” to the sun.
Did it say hi back?
No!! How dare it?!
Valle de la Muerte, Atacama Desert, Chile |
Santiago and the Atacama Desert – Our Week Revisited
It’s been a fantastic week of adventures, new friends, wild llamas, car breakdowns, altitude sickness, sand-boarding, hot springs, and so much more. Sometimes I wish I could just send you the memories in my head. They are so full and big. But alas, I’m forced to compress them into words.
After our week of rest in Punta Arenas, we flew to Santiago, the capital of Chile which was far warmer than Patagonia. As we didn’t bring coats, the heat was nice.
We only ended up staying in Santiago for a day, but here are some first impressions:
- Big. Huge main plaza surrounded with beautiful cathedrals and full of people relaxing.
- Fascinating location, right between the ocean and the Andes. Reminded us of Rio in that way with the sea/mountain/city mix.
- A bit grungier than other capital cities in South America. By “grungy,” I mean the streets were quite dirty and had lots of graffiti.
- Immigrants. Met some nice people from Cuba running a Turkish Kebab shop of all things. We also saw lots of Chinese restaurants and temples.
The San Pedro de Atacama Desert
Three years ago on Reyka and my first trip to Mexico I looked up “best stargazing on Earth” and this desert in Northern Chile came up.
As we were in Chile, we knew we had to visit it. So after Santiago we flew 2 hours north to Calama, the nearest city with an airport, rented a little Volkswagencar, and drove 2 hours to San Pedro.
It exceeded our expectations.
The Chilean Atacama Desert is maybe my favorite place we’ve visited so far in South America. It’s unlike anywhere I’ve ever seen. The dryness, rocks, and lack of vegetation make you feel like you’ve entered the worlds of Mad Max, Dune, and the Martian, just with the occasional flamingo, salt flat and tarantula.
Facts About the Atacama Desert:
- It’s the driest place on Earth outside the polar deserts, receiving less than 1 mm of precipitation annually. Some areas have not seen rain in over 500 years.
- The desert’s soil is so similar to that on Mars that NASA has sent Mars rovers to be tested there.
- As I mentioned, it’s an incredible place for stargazing. This is because of the desert’s low humidity, high altitude of 7,900 feet (which means less atmosphere for the light to pass through), and near-zero light pollution.
Other Notable Desert Experiences:
- We made friends with a Chilean/German couple also staying at our Airbnb. They came with us on many excursions. Fun to learn about Chile from a Chilean. They will be in our video.
- Saw the Tatio Geysers, the highest hot water geysers in the entire world.
- We tried sand-boarding on a nearby dune. Interestingly, it’s hard to go fast. Even though the dunes are quite steep, there’s quite a lot more friction than skateboarding or skiing. You need to use a lot of wax to start moving.
- We saw flamingos, llamas, an Andean fox, guanacos (smaller camelid animal similar to llama), and a frog. Just proves how resilient life is even in the most extreme conditions.
- Our rental car broke down in the desert mid day. Thankfully, our new friend from Chile, León, knew cars and helped fix it with a passing Chilean man Diego. The bumpy roads had caused a piece to fall off and they used duct tape to connect the wires enough to keep the car going to town where we went to a mechanic and paid 20$ for him to make us a new piece.
- We saw many sunsets. I’ve always been a lover of ocean sunsets, but I think desert sunsets may have won me over.
- We walked on a salt flat.
- I ate a cactus ice cream. Surprisingly good.
- We found a place where the hot geyser water mixed with a cold spring and produced perfect places to lounge in hot spring water. It felt wondrous. I’m in shock so many amazing things are in one place.
I cannot recommend visiting Atacama enough.
However, be warned. Just because the atmosphere is thin at night does not mean it gets thicker during the day. This means the UV index is insane. I wore face sun screen and still got badly burned after just a day.
And I think Reyka and my lips will be chapped for the next decade.
I could go on. The desert was magical. Truly.
The Next Week
All Peru! We begin with five days in Lima, before we fly to Cuzco and acclimatize to the altitidue there before scaling Machu Picchu. We also hope to visit other notable Peruvian sites like Arequipa and Lake Titicaca.
New Video!
All about Santorini, featuring epic drone shots (before it was killed be a bird), cliff diving, halloween treats (yes we filmed it that long ago), Greek food, and 5 Star Hotel we stayed at with points. We tried some fun new transitions too 🥰
Anyways, that’s it for today, folks. Please let me know what you think of this email. I know it was heavy on the pictures, but can you blame me? The desert is insane.
Alrighty then. I hope you have a great week. See you next Sunday, somewhere 🥰
Love,
Wyatt (and Reyka)