San Pedro I - Chile
9/11/05
After a lazy morning, we walked around the little streets of the dusty San Pedro, a town built in an oasis in the middle of the Atacama Desert. There are no more than 6000 inhabitants and they mainly live from the numerous tourist activities that the area offers.
The houses have a very characteristic shape, square and low. Some are painted in white because of the heat, but most of them aren't and you can see the dried mud blocks that they have been made of. From our room we could enjoy the view of the immense Licancabur volcano with its 5,950 meters of altitude.
The center of San Pedro is full of tourists wandering around.
We spoke with some tourist agencies about the different things to see around and scheduled a tour in Valle de La Luna for the next day, followed by a three-day tour-trip through the Altiplano, a region of the Andes north of Atacama, and through the salt desert that would bring us to Uyuni in Bolivia. After relaxing a bit at the main square, we headed back to the hostel.
9/12/05
Since the Valle de la Luna tour only happens in the afternoon, we spent the morning chatting with the friendly owner of the hostel, Mario, a guy from Ecuador living in Chile for the last 17 years. We then went to the tiny little market of the town where locals from the even smaller towns around come to sell all kinds of old and simple stuff. It was our first encounter with the native people from the area.
Mars Valley
Around 3 p.m. we went for our tour to the Valle de La Luna, but on the way we had a surprise, we took a shortcut and landed in Mars. This area is called the Mars Valley.
Salt Caves
Then we stopped to explore the salt caves carved by the water in a mountain made of salt crystals...
... the thing is impressive, at first look it seems to be just a mount but when you look closer you can see the cristals ...
... and the brown color we see is actually just a thin layer of dust, but the whole thing is salt.
Valle de la Luna
The Valle de la Luna is famous for its resemblance to the surface of the moon, owing to its different stratifications and the salt formations that are caused by natural environmental factors. Most of the time the color is the one of the sand of the area flying around due to strong winds but after the rain, the dust is washed away and the valley becomes all white due to the high concentration of salt crystals.
After walking around in that strange environment, watching the weird sand formations and salt crystallizations, we went to climb the dunes.
For thousands of years, strong winds have affected these reliefs, creating huge fields of sand dunes.
The Great Sand Dune is a very popular one among the tourists and it gives access to a view point to watch the sunset in the valley.
Because we had stronger winds than the usual, our guide decided that it wasn't worth, and actually quite risky, to walk the dune, so he took us to another spot less crowded where from we saw the whole area.
In fact the direction in which we walked took us to good spots to shoot the many groups walking The Great Sand Dune.
We were back in San Pedro around 8 p.m., went back to the hostel to rest and prepare for our three-day desert trip to Bolivia.
9/13/05
At 8 o'clock we were ready, waiting for our guide to pick us up. Looking out the window of our room, we realized that it was quite cloudy and that the Licancabur in the distance was getting white. We waited and waited. Mario, the owner, told us not to worry because our guide was Bolivian and Bolivians are known to be late according to Chileans. After more than an hour, our guide finally showed up, on a bike; he told us that all the agencies delayed the trips due to bad weather.
It was snowing in the mountains and the road (pass) to the border with Bolivia was not cleared. The agencies were waiting for more information from the local authorities. So we took our books and relaxed until noon when he showed up again. The authorities had decided to cancel the trips since it was too dangerous to take this road due to a now stronger snowstorm. He offered us to visit two archeological sites that are very close to San Pedro instead. They are less than 10 kilometers away from the town and are called Quitor and Tutor.
Quitor
The earliest settlement in the Atacammeño region goes back to 9,000 B.C.
During the Late Period, 1450 - 1550 A.D, the Inca Empire was in expansion since northern Peru and all the way through Bolivia with its political rules also holding across the Atacama Desert.
San Pedro was, at one point back in history, Inca. The Inca rule brought strong hierarchical differences, social inequality leading to a series of internal conflicts. These formed the background of the first Spanish-native encounters, which increased the already chaotic situation, giving way to a new era. When the Spanish defeated the Incas, the original Atacameños hided in a cave nearby San Pedro and constructed a Fort where they lived and fought back the Spanish for over 30 years after Spanish conquer. It is said that the Spanish never found the place that is today open for tourists.
After that we headed to Tulor.
Tulor Village
The ruins of a village made of a series of interconnected circular structures which had different uses and functions according to the activities carried out inside it day by day. This village belongs to one of the oldest archeological places in the northern Chilean region. The village disappeared when the river, its water source, shifted its course due to an earthquake.
After a lazy morning, we walked around the little streets of the dusty San Pedro, a town built in an oasis in the middle of the Atacama Desert. There are no more than 6000 inhabitants and they mainly live from the numerous tourist activities that the area offers.
The houses have a very characteristic shape, square and low. Some are painted in white because of the heat, but most of them aren't and you can see the dried mud blocks that they have been made of. From our room we could enjoy the view of the immense Licancabur volcano with its 5,950 meters of altitude.
The center of San Pedro is full of tourists wandering around.
We spoke with some tourist agencies about the different things to see around and scheduled a tour in Valle de La Luna for the next day, followed by a three-day tour-trip through the Altiplano, a region of the Andes north of Atacama, and through the salt desert that would bring us to Uyuni in Bolivia. After relaxing a bit at the main square, we headed back to the hostel.
9/12/05
Since the Valle de la Luna tour only happens in the afternoon, we spent the morning chatting with the friendly owner of the hostel, Mario, a guy from Ecuador living in Chile for the last 17 years. We then went to the tiny little market of the town where locals from the even smaller towns around come to sell all kinds of old and simple stuff. It was our first encounter with the native people from the area.
Mars Valley
Around 3 p.m. we went for our tour to the Valle de La Luna, but on the way we had a surprise, we took a shortcut and landed in Mars. This area is called the Mars Valley.
Salt Caves
Then we stopped to explore the salt caves carved by the water in a mountain made of salt crystals...
... the thing is impressive, at first look it seems to be just a mount but when you look closer you can see the cristals ...
... and the brown color we see is actually just a thin layer of dust, but the whole thing is salt.
Valle de la Luna
The Valle de la Luna is famous for its resemblance to the surface of the moon, owing to its different stratifications and the salt formations that are caused by natural environmental factors. Most of the time the color is the one of the sand of the area flying around due to strong winds but after the rain, the dust is washed away and the valley becomes all white due to the high concentration of salt crystals.
After walking around in that strange environment, watching the weird sand formations and salt crystallizations, we went to climb the dunes.
For thousands of years, strong winds have affected these reliefs, creating huge fields of sand dunes.
The Great Sand Dune is a very popular one among the tourists and it gives access to a view point to watch the sunset in the valley.
Because we had stronger winds than the usual, our guide decided that it wasn't worth, and actually quite risky, to walk the dune, so he took us to another spot less crowded where from we saw the whole area.
In fact the direction in which we walked took us to good spots to shoot the many groups walking The Great Sand Dune.
We were back in San Pedro around 8 p.m., went back to the hostel to rest and prepare for our three-day desert trip to Bolivia.
9/13/05
At 8 o'clock we were ready, waiting for our guide to pick us up. Looking out the window of our room, we realized that it was quite cloudy and that the Licancabur in the distance was getting white. We waited and waited. Mario, the owner, told us not to worry because our guide was Bolivian and Bolivians are known to be late according to Chileans. After more than an hour, our guide finally showed up, on a bike; he told us that all the agencies delayed the trips due to bad weather.
It was snowing in the mountains and the road (pass) to the border with Bolivia was not cleared. The agencies were waiting for more information from the local authorities. So we took our books and relaxed until noon when he showed up again. The authorities had decided to cancel the trips since it was too dangerous to take this road due to a now stronger snowstorm. He offered us to visit two archeological sites that are very close to San Pedro instead. They are less than 10 kilometers away from the town and are called Quitor and Tutor.
Quitor
The earliest settlement in the Atacammeño region goes back to 9,000 B.C.
During the Late Period, 1450 - 1550 A.D, the Inca Empire was in expansion since northern Peru and all the way through Bolivia with its political rules also holding across the Atacama Desert.
San Pedro was, at one point back in history, Inca. The Inca rule brought strong hierarchical differences, social inequality leading to a series of internal conflicts. These formed the background of the first Spanish-native encounters, which increased the already chaotic situation, giving way to a new era. When the Spanish defeated the Incas, the original Atacameños hided in a cave nearby San Pedro and constructed a Fort where they lived and fought back the Spanish for over 30 years after Spanish conquer. It is said that the Spanish never found the place that is today open for tourists.
After that we headed to Tulor.
Tulor Village
The ruins of a village made of a series of interconnected circular structures which had different uses and functions according to the activities carried out inside it day by day. This village belongs to one of the oldest archeological places in the northern Chilean region. The village disappeared when the river, its water source, shifted its course due to an earthquake.
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