Day 24-25 San Pedro de Atacama - Moon & Death Valley and Geysers

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Photo Album:  San Pedro de Atacama - Moon & Death Valleys and Geysers

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Probably due to the Easter Holidays, the night was very noisy, and partly, being in a crowded camping area, there were 30 -40 campers in a very small and rough area. 

First it was yelling and laughing from some drinking party of holidaying Chileans, taking their Easter break. Then its the dogs barking, after the neighbours decided to have pillow talks 2 am in the very cold morning.

By around 3 am., someone’s alarm clock chirped, followed by someone turning on their powerful car stereo system....altogether, plus a very cold and restless night of sleep on hard ground.  Despite have 3 blankets and a sleeping bag, a chill was still felt as I try to fall asleep, amidst all that cacophony. This had to be the WORST night of camping in my last 7 years anywhere, period.

As soon as the sun came out, the temperature rose rapidly, by 9 am, it was already quite comfortable under the sun.

We had nothing on the program, so I decided to sit back, relax and catch up on some writings.  There is no Wifi in the campsite, the alternative is to walk into town for Internet Cafe.  I stayed put.

As the campsite only has solar hot water, I took advantage of the bright sun after noon, to have a hot shower.

It was simply too hot to do anything during the day with the raging sun.

We left at 4 pm. for a guided tour of the nearby Death Valley and Moon Valley, finished with sitting atop a huge dune, to watch the sunset and the changing colours of the spectacular geological formations.

The ever present Licancabur Volcano

The Three Marias

The formations here are in some way similar to those of UTAH and Arizona, with a difference, in that, it’s seems less  stable due to the lack of compactness of the soil, and there are much more evident displace of salt crystals.  We were brought through a cavern tunnel to see the salt crystals that are lying inside and outside of the soils.

 

Some of us joined an option excursion to checkout the geysers of San Pedro, but it meant a very early morning start..like in COLD  4:30 am. 

This meant for us to get to the Geysers del Taito, 90 Km away, at -15 degree C when we arrive at the National Park, still in the dark.  It was the twilight and cold conditions that offers the best viewing conditions of these steamy things.

However, these geysers, though being the 2^nd highest elevation Geysers at 4500m ASL, their eruption volumes are not spectacular nor are they comparable to those of Yellowstone in scale, as well as eruption heights.  But nevertheless interesting.

Scientifically speaking, it is these geysers under deep see volcano, that formed the first component of carbon organic life, of which human being evolved from.

We were served with a simple breakfast cooked by a small geyser, eggs were not quite hard boiled !

As the temperature was freezing cold, and the guide told us that it went as low as -15 deg just before the sun rose over the mountain top.

Many people decided to jump into the hot spring for a dip, however, 

I thought otherwise, for fear of coming out into the very cold outside, a huge temperature difference, from 37 to -9 or so.  That turned out to be wise, as my stomach was beginning to cramp up...probably due to the not properly cooked breakfast.

As we descended in daylight, we passed a couple of wetlands, and villages, and were introduced to many local faunas and floras.

Guanaco

After returning to the camp site and had lunch, I went into the town, which is only one block away, to look at all the mud buildings, which is very common in this area.  By then, it was a warm 20 Deg or so.

San Pedro is only a small township, no more than 10-12 streets, built around the town square.  In reality, the sole existence of this town, is tourism.  But not mass tourism !

Then one of the most upsetting things happened, one of our younger team member had her iPhone stolen from the charging pool, which I was sitting next to during all that time. However, for the life of me, I did not notice any strangers, other than a family of fellow campers, possibly Chileans, were there all that time too.  Really puzzled !!  I had my suspicions about a camp site worker who was working around there, but is had to someone who is quick and audacious to do that with me and others sitting around the place.  Very strange indeed !

Some of us went for an evening Star Gazing tours nearby, which we were given a talk on the map of the sky, the phony astrologies and some telescope gazing as well.  It is both interesting and informative.

Atacama has the clearest sky of the Earth, and it has many telescope installations, with the one of the largest International telescope arrays nearby as well.

Next Post:  Escape from Atacama - and the surprise birthday cake

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