Pretty Flamingos, a Big Cactus and a Couple of Geysers!

Our plane lands in the evening at Calama airport and our journey is about an hour to our hotel, NO1 Casa Atacama, in San Pedro. There was no street lighting or hardly any buildings along our route, so all we could see were the stars. We knew we were in the desert, but this was really eerie. The next day we had the morning to ourselves, so we wandered into San Pedro. It was like walking onto a The Good, the Bad and the Ugly film set. The streets were all mud and dust, the buildings were all one storey and built with a mud/straw brick. The local population were certainly 'hippy' influenced. But the place had a wonderful charm about it. We took a side street and chanced a restaurant that looked okay. In fact we had a great meal, consisting of Cazuelas (a sort of beef soup cum stew) and then Pollo al Horno (roast chicken). Later, we found out that the restaurant was reckoned to be the best in the town by one of our guides!

We had three excursions over our 3 days whilst here. Firstly, we go to Atacama Salt Lake and Toconao. Toconao is a small village primarily known for its church, that dates from 1750. After that, we head for Salar de Atacama, the largest salt flat in Chile, in time for sunset. At the lake are 3 different types of flamingos and as the sun drops, everything turns the colour of the flamingos - pink. Seccondly, wthe bext day we leave the hotel at 5.30am to go to El Tatio Geysers and Machuca. The El Tatio geysers are at an altitude of 4,300m, the highest point we have been so far on our trip. However, we are coping well with the high altitude, with no real affects other than a loss of appetite. Whilst it's cold (freezing, in fact), it was amazing to see so many geysers shoot the jets of hot steam so high in the air. Nearby, there is a natural hot spring and Diane gets into her swimming costume to take a dip. She said it was wonderful. We then head off to Machuca, for a brief stop at this tiny settlement, before getting to see a cactus that was over 500 years old. Our final excursion is to Moon Valley, that sits within the world's driest desert. Moon Valley has some weird rock formations, some fantastic sand dunes and wonderful salt 'figures', such as Tres Marias (the Three Marias). We go to a plateau overlooking nearby Mars Valley, so called because at sunset, it glows a red colour. And so it did for us, as we had a sunset picnic alongside many locals doing the same as us.

The final day, we had time to chill at our great hotel, soaking up the warm sunshine next to the pool. Next stop is Peru!