San Pedro de Atacama: Is this real life?



Never have I ever seen nature so strange and so beautiful as I saw in San Pedro de Atacama. If I wasn't a nature lover before, I certainly am now!

 

San Pedro, in northern Chile, is in the middle of the driest desert in the world. When the sun is out, it's over 80 degrees, but a dry heat. At night, it drops to nearly 40 degrees. But San Pedro also lies at about 2,400 meters (7,900 feet) above sea level. So while the little adobe town is dry and dusty, the mountains and Lincancabur volcano in the distance are snow capped, creating a strangely beautiful contrast. Even though it almost never rains in the area, the runoff from the melting snow on the mountains is enough to produce and sustain vegetation in the middle of the desert, creating an even more stunning contrast of colors in the region.



Valle de la Muerte



San Pedro is a tiny little backpacker haven, filled single-story adobe houses,  unpaved streets, and countless tourist offices. Travelers from all over the world come to stay here for the easy access to the numerous natural attractions nearby.



My first stop was to the Valle de la Luna and Valle de la Muerte These areas of red rock formations, sand dunes, and salt-covered terrain really look like another planet (hence why the areas are called the Moon Valley and Death or Mars Valley). After some hiking around the dunes and cliffs, I watched the sun set over the valley, casting beautiful colors onto the snow capped peaks in the background.





The next day, I ventured higher above sea level (about 4,200 meters or 13,500 feet) to reach two altiplano lagoons, Laguna Miscanti and Laguna Miñiques. I was left breathless, not just from the lack of oxygen due to the altitude, but also at the sight of the vast blue lakes with volcanoes and mountains towering above them. On the way back down to San Pedro, we stopped at a flamingo reserve to see the Chilean flamingos feasting and flying among salt-rock formations in the Chaxa Lagoon.

Laguna Miscanti


Early the next morning (4am!), I headed out to El Tatio, a geyser field with over 80 active geysers. The volcanic activity in the region creates really strange and stunning effects, such as these geysers and nearby natural hot thermal baths where you could bravely take a swim (even though the water was over 100 degrees, the air temperature was below freezing because it was at 4,200 meters above sea level...and before the sunrise!).

  

Later in the day and back at sea level, the sun was out and the air was hot and dry. So I headed to another lagoon, Laguna Cejar, which has an incredibly high salt content, so you can easily float without even trying. In fact, it's really hard not to float. I tried to swim down or even tread water and found it nearly impossible: my limbs naturally floated back up to the surface.

The nights in San Pedro are just as beautiful as the days because Northern Chile is one of the best places in the world for stargazing. A little ways outside the city I took an Astronomical Celestial Tour: a stargazing adventure at an Astronomical base where you could look through heavy duty telescopes to view constellations, Mars, Saturn, and other galaxies. Even without a telescope, the night sky was the most beautiful I have ever seen (one thing I definitely miss living in the city). It looked so unreal!



For my last day in San Pedro, I rented a bike and explored the sprawling desert landscape. I biked among the red rocks and dunes and headed to Pukará de Quitor, a fort built by the Atacameño people in the 12th century. I hiked up to the top of the fort for an incredible view over the Atacama valley, overlooking San Pedro and the surrounding mountains. I still couldn't get over the beautiful contrasting colors of the red desert, the vibrant green vegetation, and the snow covered peaks in the distance. It looked like the desktop background picture on a computer, the colors too vibrant to be real.

The natural beauty near San Pedro seemed too incredible to be real.

It's times like these when I'm standing in the middle of the desert, or on the top of a mountain, or looking at the sun setting over a deep blue lagoon that I can't help but acknowledge that God is real, and He is the most creative and talented artist ever.

It's moments like these that I feel so big and so small at the same time.

It's times like these that make all the hassles and costs of traveling so worth it.

It's moments like these that make me feel so blessed to have such incredible adventures.