San Pedro

(10/5-10/7) Well this weekend Katie and I journeyed to San Pedro de Atacama. It is a desert in the north of Chile. It’s not just any desert, it’s the driest desert in the whole world. It was a crazy awesome experience though. We left Santiago pretty early Friday morning and Phil drove us to the airport around 6:30am. We got to the airport and waited a couple of hours because of course the flight was delayed…typical Chile for you. The flight was two hours and five minutes. We made it to Calama around 11:30am and took a taxi to the bus station and then took a bus to San Pedro which was about an hour and a half away from there. We spent a good 30 minutes looking for our hostel when we arrived and then when we checked in we book a sand boarding/moon valley tour for an hour later. We literally threw our stuff down changed and then the tour bus came to pick us up. It was awesome though. Our first stop was this huge sand dune that we were going to sand board on. It took almost all of my energy to climb the dune but boarding down it was incredible. We spent about an hour doing that so I got in about four runs. I fell a lot and wasn’t too good at it, but it was fun none the less. After that we went to the moon valley which is just this huge valley in the desert. Our first stop there was this really cool salt cave. It was dark and the path was small but inside was amazing. It was just so pretty. Plus the walls were edible so I took a few pieces of salt to lick. We didn’t stay too long there, just long enough to walk through once. We went to this huge cliff after that to watch the sunset. The climb was pretty substantial but it was definitely worth it. It was amazing seeing the sunset in the desert and turning around to watch the colors change on the mountains. Truly incredible. When we got back to the hostel we ate dinner and then went to bed. Saturday we went on a geyser tour which we had to be ready at 4:30am for. The geysers are apparently better viewed in the morning before day light so that’s why it was so early. And we had to drive almost two hours away. Again, it was worth it. It was incredible. It was freezing though, around 15F. There were so many geysers and hot springs and I had never seen anything like it before. After that we got to actually go in a natural hot spring. I was skeptical at first because it was so cold, but I did it. I’m glad I did, it was perfect. Also on the trip we saw so many animals, two Chilean animals that I had never heard of, a fox, and a bunch of llamas. It was pretty incredible. We got back to the hostel around 1pm and I took a much needed two hour nap. When I woke up, Katie and I went into town and rented mountain bikes. We took a 12 mile bike ride into this random part of the desert where we found the cutest little white church. Getting there was really hard because I, knowing nothing about mountain bikes, had it in a gear with the most resistance. Stupid! But the ride back was much easier and I enjoyed it a lot. There was this one part of the path where we had to cross a river and it was so deep we had to take our shoes off and walk across with our bikes. That was my favorite part though because it was so hot and the water was so cold it felt really good. It took us about 3 ½ hours and man were we sore afterwards. It was beautiful though. When we got back to the hostel we got ready because we decided that we would have one fancy meal in town while we were there. We went to this restaurant called Todo Natural and it was delicious. I got a brick oven pizza and a side of vegetables. It was the perfect meal after such a long day. I went to sleep shortly after returning to our hostel because I was exhausted. Sunday we did a little shopping in town. I bought a few little souvenirs for my family and just enjoyed seeing what the town had to offer. At about 4pm we did a salt lagunas tour. It was pretty fun and the tour made three stops. The first stop was this huge laguna called Laguna Tebenquiche but it wasn’t very deep. It was crystal clear and really beautiful! We didn’t stay there too long because it was only about ankle deep and there wasn’t much to do. The second stop was called Ojos del Salar which were basically two holes in the ground with salt water. You had to jump off a huge cliff and then swim to a place you could get out. Of course I had to jump in and I’m not even kidding when I say that it was the coldest water I have ever been in. It was like 42F and I couldn’t breathe when I hit the water. It was shocking. It was fun though so I don’t regret it. We left shortly after because only four people in our group jumped. The last stop was the Laguna Cejar which is so salty that you float without doing anything. It keeps you above water naturally. The water was pretty cold there too but I had to experience it. It was so interesting and quite an experience. After watching the sunset there our tour headed back. When we got to the hostel we took showers, ate, and decided to go check out some stars. In San Pedro you can see four times as many stars than anywhere else in the whole world. It was so clear and absolutely gorgeous. It literally took my breath away. Some guy from the hostel went with us too which was really interesting because he had a lot of questions about religion that he asked Katie and I. It was amazing getting to explain God’s love under such an amazing view. We read the Bible and listened to some music and just talked about God for about an hour. After a while it got too cold so we had to go in, but it was a night that I will never forget. We had to pack up when we got back and go to bed because we had a pretty early bus to catch Monday morning. It was such an incredible weekend and I’m so blessed that I got to have this experience! 

sand boarding

Moon Valley

Geysers

natural hot spring

biking in the desert

salt laguna

the coldest water ever

just floating