Nov 10, Thursday & Nov 11, Friday

Nov 11, Friday

Checking out of hotel this morning.  Taking a bus to Calama this afternoon and staying there for one night, unless I can manage to get a flight to Santiago today.  Otherwise flying to Santiago on Nov 12.

 Feeling a lot better !
Pics of San Pedro de Atacama streets

  Hotel - Tarrantai Lodge

  Patio area of hotel

   Pool area of Hotel

  Restaurant where I lunched.  Check out the name board.  They are everywhere and all carved out of wood.

  Bank that screwed me.  Street leading to main square

  Main Square

  Church

  Typical  Street in San Pedro de Atacama

   Typical Street in San Pedro de Atacama.  Lots of dogs everywhere.

I took pictures of my legs because they are full of bites and bruises.  No idea what bit me by the way; obviously no mosquitoes in these high desert areas.  Someone told me they could be sand mites or sand flees.  YIKES.   All I know is, everywhere I’ve been bitten it’s red and swollen bigger than the size of a loonie.

The bus ride to Calama was pretty much the same scenery as the high desert areas of Bolivia.   They have their own Valle de la Luna here, and from what I saw of it, it really did look like a moonscape. 

   Moonscape

  Back to high mountain desert

  Back to rocky flat desert

We got in to Calama at about 2 pm.  It is another oasis town;  a bit of greenery in a desert setting. 

  They have town houses !

Unfortunately nothing much at the bus station, so I caught a cab downtown to find a travel agency to book a flight.   The “cab” was a private vehicle, but the guy had business cards, hopefully his !   He turned out to be quite the gentleman.   He told me I needed to go to either a LAN or SKY Airline office and added that Sky would cost less.   When we got to the sky office he pointed it out to me across the street.  I told him that since I was travelling alone, I had been told to be very careful and not leave my luggage in a taxi while I was doing something else.   He wasn’t angry at all and offered to come with me to the office.   Since I was the only client, I got served first and quickly obtained a ticket for a flight leaving at 5:45, arriving in Santiago at 7:45.  By then the office had filled up with customers.   Just a lucky day for me.   We got back in the taxi and he drove me to the airport and helped me with my luggage.  Needless to say this guy got a really nice tip.

The flight to Santiago was smooth and I was able to see a lot from the window, facing the Pacific Ocean. The high desert continued for about 1 hour and reached all the way to the ocean.

  Taken from the plane window so not great quality, but you can definintely see the desert going all the way to the ocean.

By  the 2nd hour the scenery slowly started to change into rolling mountains with narrow green valleys.   Then I started seeing more rivers and lakes and the valleys became wider with beautiful agricultural fields everywhere.

I had checked the internet for possible hotel accommodations, but had not booked anything in advance.   Caught the airport taxi (the one recommended on the Internet) and got to the Hotel Providencia.   Unfortunately no rooms available for the next 6 days.  The man at the reception desk was extremely nice and called a number of hotels to try to find me a room ; above and beyond the call to duty).   He found me a reasonably priced smaller hotel in the Providencia part of the city,  and called for a taxi to take me there.   So here I am, all settled in for the next three nights.

Nov 10, Thursday

Slept very well and found out that it is one hour later here than it was in Bolivia.  I ate a full breakfast even though I wasn’t really hungry.   I’m spending the day relaxing around the hotel.  Went out at 2:30 to make reservations for the bus to Calama for tomorrow.   (It will leave at 1 pm and arrive at about  2:30.)    Walked around the town for a bit and found the archaeological museum quite by accident, so I went in for a visit.

  My room key has this tag attached.  Look familiar you Arizona fans?

  Museum

  Huge tree in the main plaza

  Restaurant where I had lunch

Needed to exchange my Bolivianos for Chilean Pesos so I asked a police officer for directions and found the street that has all the money exchange booths.   Again I was told (twice) that it was 500 pesos for each dollar!   Definitely need to check on-line for exchange rate.  Either I got fleeced by the bank, or the Canadian dollar is doing very badly against the USA dollar, or the money exchange people really want to get their hands on dollars.

Stopped for a very late lunch at 4 pm (ham & vegetable quiche with lots of cucumber and tomatoes on the side).   Back at the hotel I decided to go check-out the water temperature in the pool;  it’s freezing, so a dip is completely out of the question.  The sun is very hot and it is very dry air since we are located on the side of a desert.   They say San Pedro is an oasis, but I haven’t seen any water anywhere yet.

Internet verification confirms $1.00  =  approx 500 Chilean Pesos.  Got screwed by a Bank !