Moving on to Iquique

Sunday 23rd December 2007

We left San Pedro behind and headed towards Iquique which is further north on the coast.

As we ascended out of the basin where San Pedro is situated we came across a vicuna with her child. You can see from the photo how arid the surrounding landscape is.



We filled the car at Calama as petrol stations are few and far between in Chile.

Trucks at the petrol station loaded with some very big tyres, destined for the copper mine.

We passed Chuquicamata copper mine and took a picture of the huge, green slag heaps which dominate the town.

The black line behind the sign is the town.

Then it was back down to Ruta 5. The scale of things in Chile are completely alien to Europe where, even on the emptiest motorways, there are service stations every thirty miles or so. The next petrol station we passed was at Victoria which was 272 km from Calama.

We saw some more geoglyphs on the way but there were not as distinct as the ones at Chug Chug.

There are human figures on the hillside...honest!

Iquique has a tax free zone, and to get into the area you have to be checked out by customs. Nothing tells you what to do, but we saw other people parking their cars at the custom point and queueing at an office, where a solitary man in no particular rush examined drivers’ papers. We did not have the right paperwork and were despatched back to the car to look for them. He seemed interested in the fact that we were Ukrainian, as that is what it says on our car hire papers.

Eventually we got through and drove through more nitrate pampa, with lonely graveyards on hillsides, slowly being buried by the sand. The occasional sign tells you there was a nitrate “oficina” there once, and the dates when it operated. Apart from that, the landscape was bleak, with endless, bendless roads.

Finally at the colourful town of Pozo Almonte, we turned down the road to Iquique. The descent to the town is very steep, and there is a huge sand dune which looms ominously over Iquique. On the front there are signs which tell you the evacuation route if there is a tsunami.

Therefore it was of great relief to discover that our hotel is right on the beach, and we have a ground floor room. This is the view from our room.

Moon valley

Volcan Licancabur (5916m) and Joan (1.52m)

Saturday 22nd December

Today is our last full day in San Pedro. We decided to take it relatively easy after two long days, so we visited the local museum. The museum charted the history of the local inhabitants, and displayed lots of stones, bits of pottery and textile. There was also some jewellery made out of gold for ceremonial purposes. The most famous exhibits, some ancient mummified bodies, have been removed in regard to the sensitivities of the indigenous population.

We looked inside the church where people were decorating the altar in time for Christmas. Outside was a large Nativity.

During the day the village is quite deserted as all the tourists (including ourselves) are out on trips. At night it all comes back to life with lots of bustling restaurants and open stores. There is a lot of construction going on in the village, for example new flagged pavements and what looks like a new coach station. One can not help thinking that if we came back in five year’s time, it would be a completely different place. In our hotel there has been a steady flow through of tourists, mainly European or Japanese, and menus and guides are available in lots of different languages. However, we have been warned that this may not be the case elsewhere. Nevertheless we have tried to avoid using English, and have done pretty well so far.

In the afternoon we went to Valle de la luna, the last thing on the tourist tick list. So far we have been used to everything being long distances away and also being on an immense scale. This was just outside San Pedro and we had driven through it before we realised we had missed one of the highlights, three stone pillars called the Tres Marias. However, to appease some of our most serious critics (see comments), we tried to take some photos with a point of reference in so you could appreciate the scale. Mr Kodak would have been proud of us!

Kevin reading the information sign. It was blank.


We also needed to use the 4X4 drive to get ourselves out of the sand. We then tried to find the Ruinas de Tulon, the vestiges of an ancient settlement that was partially excavated in the 1960s. We did find a sign, but after driving across the sands for a while we gave up. Instead we took a photo of the sign.

We filled up the tank at the petrol station ready for tomorrow’s long journey and headed back to the hotel for a beer. Here is a photograph. We put in Kevin so you could appreciate the scale of the beer bottle!!

At San Pedro

Wednesday 19th December

A lazy day. Set off quite late from Calama. We noticed that all but one of the vehicles parked in the hotel car park were 4WDs. Not surprising as you need one, as we found out yesterday.

Head up another very long, straight road to San Pedro de Atacama. Eventually we wound up a hill, and at the top saw the great salt white flats.

Standing over the valley is the imposing Licancabur volcano.

San Pedro is Chile’s top tourist resort (allegedly) so it was a shock to see narrow streets with cobbled together adobe houses, with hardly any decent roads to speak of. It does now though have a petrol station and an ATM, quite a relief when you consider the next petrol station and bank are 100 km away in Calama.

Our hotel is 300m south of the centre and based around a square. It is single storey.



We walked into the centre of the town, and after 2 minutes realised we had seen all there is to see. Though to be fair you do not stay in San Pedro for the town itself, rather for the stunning surroundings. There were lots of tour operators offering trips to the sites, quite a few cafes and lots of backpackers, sat in the hot square.

We ate lunch on the square and were bothered by flies. This was a first and is most likely explained by San Pedro being an oasis, with quite a lot of green vegetation.

The ubiquitous Chilean dogs were sleeping in the shade, and we noticed that the ones who did trot about stuck to the shaded side of the street.

There was a big nativity set outside of the church, and some sort of children’s ceremony was going on.

The local police station and the council offices.

The church

The main road in to town

It is really hot here and the sun is very intense.

We went out about 8.30 pm in search of dinner and went to a wholefood place. It was very rustic with plain wooden tables and highly uncomfortable benches. Towards the end of our meal there was a power cut, and the waiters had to work by candlelight. Then suddenly a trio of Chilean musicians appeared playing traditional music. One even had a flute, though we were disappointed that he did not play it with his nose! Then a strange figure emerged with a huge white mask and black mane. Kevin likened him to Michael Jackson in Thriller. He coaxed a few ladies to dance with him, but luckily not Joan.

A hat went round and they went away. A few minutes later the power went back on. We then walked back. The skies were very clear, and we could see an upside down Orion, Taurus, and Auriga.