Winter Vacation (OVERDUE account)

After months of nagging (thank you Renee and Elizabeth) and procrastinating, I’m finally back to get this thing up to speed. . . I hope. (it may take a few posts to get there) I’ll start where I left off (skipping the unnecessary details, of course) - - preparing for the epic journey to the Atacama Desert in Chile and Machu Picchu. Well, epic doesn’t even begin to describe it. However, it was a great experience that I walked away from with amazing memories and stories.
Traveling with new friends is always a little stressful to me(as was the case with Renee and Megan- who are now considered future bridesmaid material), but we made it through two weeks with only a couple abbreviated incidents of shortness and snappiness. (I think menstruation was probably involved so we’re not completely culpable) If any conditions could test our affection for one another, that trip certainly delivered, so I feel REALLY lucky to not only have made great friends in Santiago, but also those who love to travel as much as I do and who I’m compatible traveling with.
While the company was fantastic, the trip did have its pitfalls. Like the first half hour into it, when we arrived at the Santiago airport and my reservation had accidentally been cancelled. Thank you LANChile. As some of you may know by my prior rants and raves, Chilean customer service DOES.NOT.EXIST. Of course it was my fault that the LAN representative cancelled my flight, even though I had a confirmation number and a credit card receipt, showing that I’d paid for the ticket. Still being my fault, I charged another ticket to Calama (in the North of Chile), paying three times as much as the original ticket cost- all the while being assured that I could appeal for reimbursement. Knowing how quick and efficient Chilean business is, I was pretty upset- convinced that IF I did get the money back, it wouldn’t be until long after I was already back in Seattle, making real money and it wouldn’t even matter. Megan poured on the optimism, trying to assure me that the worse off a vacation starts, the better it ends up, so we held on to her theory to get back into our happy mode- despite our 4:30AM wakeup call and 6:30AM flight.
After we got to Calama, we took a bus to San Pedro, enjoying the sun and very clear skies (again, I will NEVER again take clean air for granted). The view wasn’t much to brag about, just barren desert. I was worried that we’d been tricked into seeing some “beautiful” spot in Chile, when really it was just flat rocks and loose sand, with fancy names. Fortunately, it wasn’t the case. We settled into our “ensuite” room, freshened up a bit and headed out to make the most of our stay. We had three days and 50+ tours to choose from. We meandered ‘downtown’ to check out the best deals and get our schedule set. This was an easy feat, given that ‘downtown’ San Pedro is about the length of A city block. Charming, no less. For a town thriving solely on tourism, it was surprising to me that we didn’t have to fight off tour operators hustling gringas for business- but a nice relief.
The first afternoon, we walked around Valle de la Luna and Valle de la Muerte with a small group (the leader of which I was crushing on pretty hard, talking his ear off trying to get a number. . .). The sweet city girls I was with (Renee and Megan) were so proud of their first ever ‘hike’, and saying that they should have dressed more appropriately had they known we’d be doing trekking. This thoroughly amused me, since I only consider walking to be “hiking”, if there’s an incline involved (mind you, I realize I’m no outdoors adventure guru). They kept saying “wow, I’ve never been hiking!”- to which I kept snottily replying, “and you STILL haven’t”. ok, so maybe they’ve been on a SHORT hike, because at the VERY end of our tour, we climbed a sand dune to watch the sun set and witnessed an incredible view of the mountains, rocks and desert bathed in amazing color patters from the sun (see photo links). We were all incredibly pooped since we’d only slept a couple hours at Megan’s the night before flying out- our “we need to be in bed by 8PM” turned into a flashback to 7th grade slumber party, complete with cookies, chips, gossip and lots of snickering. I don’t think anyone slept before 2:30 and our shuttle picked us up at 4:30. So, we spent the night at the hostel, relaxing and bracing ourselves for another day of tours in the desert. (Times like these were when I REALLY learned to appreciate the fact that I my companions were so cool. Being stuffed onto buses, trains, planes, tour vans and into hostels, this trip could’ve been a COMPLETELY different story.
The second day, we went to the Ojos del Salar - - two small bodies of water in the middle of the driest desert in the world, that look like eyes (again, see photo links) then for a quick float in a salt lake. Literally, we struggled to ‘swim’ because the salt concentration was so high. Not only did the salinity have a strange effect, but the temperature was crazy as well. We waded out in freezing cold water to what looked like a submerged pool, crossed the rock border and were suddenly in Jacuzzi- hot water. The guide warned us about the heat but didn’t do a good enough job. Apparently the deeper you go, the hotter the water is. I only realized this after extending my feet straight down, while playing with the buoyancy. OUCH! The pain was so bad that I was actually surprised to not have had burns on my feet. After our burning dip, we headed out to another laguna to see some flamingos and watch another sunset. This time we enjoyed colors even more impressive than the first night. We kicked back and enjoyed a typical Chilean spread of cookies, chips and boxed juice while taking it all in.
Realizing that there wasn’t anything to do in San Pedro except for take desert tours, we decided to buck up and go on one last tour to so we all would have seen what we wanted to see, then we could spend more time in Peru where there might actually be some culture and/or nightlife to take part in. Our last quest was to see the Tatio Geysers, which are about 2 hours outside of San Pedro. We were set and ready to go, spending our last day in SP at the geysers. Because the views are best at sunrise, we had to get an early (EARLY) start. The shuttle picked us up at 4AM (an hour becoming far too familiar to us) and we were stuffed in and on our way. In the first few minutes of the trip, I was wondering how the hell I could stand being so crammed but when we started to climb altitude and I started to FREEZE MY BLOODY ASS OFF, I was thrilled at sharing body heat. When we got to the geysers, it was still dark and painfully cold. I’ve born plenty of Utah winters, but somehow they didn’t compare to that morning’s conditions. The cold HURT. I’d never experienced it before. We were warned not to jump around to stay warm, given the dramatic change in altitude, but I figured I was going to suffer one way or another, so I jogged in place and rubbed my gloved hands together as hard as I possibly could until the sun came up and provided some relief to the biting cold. It was a view worth waiting for, despite the grounds being littered with tourists. No major geyser action, just lots of jets of steam that were quite beautiful against the sunrise.
After returning to SP, we showered and packed, then were on our way back to Calama, where we would catch our overnight bus to Arica (the northernmost city in Chile). On previous weekend trips here and there, we’d joked about broken down, ghetto ass buses but we had no idea what a ghetto ass bus was until we climbed aboard this one. Reggeaton was on full blast from the driver’s booth, seats were stuck in reclined position, overhead bins were collapsing, seats were stuck in ERECTLY UPRIGHT position, unpleasant smells were wafting throughout the cabin, the engine sounded like it was running on an old washing machine spin cycle and strange clinks and clanks could be heard during the whole hour drive. Renee and I were really amused, but at the same time crossing our fingers to JUST MAKE OUR CONNECTION!!! Well, that clunker got us where we needed to go. After a quick bite of Chinese food we were on the third of countless bus rides and on our way to Peru (via Arica)!
. . . . . to be continued.