We ended our tour of the Bolivian salt flats on the border of Chile, where we had to take a shuttle bus down 2000m to the town of San Pedro de Atacama. The moment we crossed the border from Bolivia to Chile we could sense a difference... for a start, it was the first paved road we'd driven on in weeks!
San Pedro is a little town located in an oasis on the Atacama desert. For some reason, I was expecting it to be a city, so when we arrived and found a dusty little country town, I was a bit disappointed. But things quickly started looking up, especially when we managed to get through Chilean customs without having to pay the $60 entrance fee that Australians are supposed to pay.
At the bus terminal, we chose a decent looking hostel from the hawkers who came to meet us, bargained a little, then took a roundabout ute ride through town to find that our hostel was actually a fair distance from the centre. But, it was homely and comfortable, and most importantly, had a scalding hot shower. We also got a connection to the net for the first time in weeks, only to find worried emails from both of our parents...
On first look, we weren't too impressed by San Pedro. The streets are full of tourists - it's difficult to find someone there who isn't carrying a backpack! By the time we left, though, I'd really started to like the place. It's got a unique, funky, style of it's own, and even though we struggled a lot with the Chilean spanish, everyone was really friendly and warm towards us. We spent a few days there, relaxing and touring around the Atacama desert, before boarding a bus south.
Next stop for us was La Serena. For the first time in months we were back on the coast, and back at sea-level altitudes. And to top it off, our first sight on arrival was a giant shopping centre and a McDonalds. Needless to say that was our first destination after checking into a hostel! The mall became a regular destination for us during our stay there, as Maryanne slowly ate into her tax return and started replacing tired old clothes...
From La Serena we also took two guided tours. The first was to a nature reserve an hour north, called the Humboldt Penguin Reserve. With our tour guide, an Italian primary school teacher, we took a little boat out on rough seas to check out an island full of penguins, sea lions, comorants and other animals. He also took us to a second island, with a beach for swimming, but given that it's the middle of winter here no-one really felt like bathing there.
The second tour was to the Mamaluca observatory, where we were given a basic tour of the visible constellations and various other things that we could see through their telescope. This was a bit disappointing - we expected to be taken to a real observatory, but Mamaluca is solely aimed at tourists. It was all fairly lightweight and unfortunately nothing really new for me! :P
Right now, we're in the capital, Santiago. We've got supermarkets, fast food, and flushable toilet paper. It feels great to be back in familiar surroundings. In fact, Santiago reminds us a lot of Melbourne. It's got the same weather, and the streets, shops, and buildings all look like what you'd see back home. We're really loving it here.
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