We had Plan A and Plan B for Chile, depending on how Steve coped with an extended period at 2,500m altitude in Arequipa, but both involved getting to the city of Arica just inside the Chilean border.

• Plan A was to take a 12 hour overnight bus from Arica to San Pedro de Atacama, at 2,400m altitude, spend a few days there then fly down to Santiago from the nearest airport (Calama)
• Plan B would mean abandoning the supposedly breathtaking Atacama Desert and flying directly to Santiago from Arica

We booked fully refundable flight tickets for both options with LATAM while they were still a reasonable price, so could decide once we reached Arica if necessary.

Getting to Arica

Alighting our bus at Tacna (Peru) at 12.30 after the 7 hour journey from Arequipa, we needed to get from the national to international bus terminal for our onward journey – luckily they were directly opposite each other. We could’ve got a taxi to Arica but Steve was being a tight-wad and wanted to do the border crossing in the more authentic way – by collectivo, effectively a shared taxi for which you purchase a seat and the standard 5-seater saloon car leaves when it is totally full. The terminal was chaos, we saw a ‘collectivo’ sign and headed for it, were herded towards a car, confirmed the price, our luggage was loaded into the boot, and then the driver asked whether we had our embarkation cards. Nope. So Steve stayed with the car/bags while the helpful driver whizzed Debbie and our passports around various ticket offices for passport details to be entered, customs declarations completed on our behalf (40p each), the collectivo booked (we should’ve gone there first apparently), and the 20p bus terminal tax paid. And then we were squashed into the car with 2 other passengers, none of us exactly petite, for the 20 mile journey to the border crossing. Luckily the others didn’t have any big luggage.

At the border we exited the car, removed our luggage, and our driver took us as a group to the ‘Exit Peru’ counters, where our passports were stamped. We then crossed a road and queued for the ‘Enter Chile’ counters where our travelling companions (they were either Peruvian or Chilean) were waved through, it took an age for Steve to get his passport stamped and Debbie was through quickly afterwards. We were also given printed slips with barcodes – no-one told us what they were but it’s a good job we kept them safe as they are required to check in to any hotel and to exit the country. Then our bags were scanned – the Chileans are very very strict about not bringing fruit and vegetables into the country – and we all piled back into the taxi and continued another 10 miles to Arica bus station. The cost of this transport service and border crossing assistance? Just £5 each!

And then a taxi to our hotel, which at £2.50 seemed comparatively terrible value for a 1 mile journey!!

Arica

We planned to stay in Arica for 1 night regardless of whether we were following Plan A or B as we had no idea how smoothly we’d get there, so both a flight to Santiago and an overnight bus to San Pedro de Atacama had been booked for the following day. Steve decided that he felt OK to tackle Atacama, so the reserve flight was cancelled and the refund was processed by LATAM and returned to the credit card within minutes.

As it turned out, we were at the hotel by 14.30, so could’ve easily made and overnight bus the same day, but it would’ve been brutal on the back of a 9 hour journey from Arequipa. We’d not booked accommodation until it looked likely that we would make it to Arica that day, so Debbie made a reservation at the Novotel from the bus, a new hotel at the beach which looked perfect to just relax and do nothing for a day while waiting to depart for San Pedro.

We had a couple of Happy Hour Pisco Sours, a bottle of wine and dinner in the hotel restaurant – my God, those cocktails were strong! We lazed around the following day catching up on life admin (it wasn’t warm enough to sit by the pool) and looking out at the surf, before having the worst pizza ever at the restaurant next door and heading off in an Uber (with Pisco Sours in takeaway cups!) for the bus station and our overnight journey.

The bus to San Pedro de Atacama

Debbie wanted to get there early, so we rocked up at the Pullman Bus counter at 20.00 for our 21.00 departure, handed our ticket confirmation from 12Go.com to a miserable-looking girl behind the screen, and were greeting with the response ‘No’! With a great deal of effort we managed to get her to expand to ‘bus suspended’. ‘When will there be a bus?’ we asked and got a shrug of the shoulders. ‘Refund?’ The same shrug and then she turned away and started picking her nose – a delightful customer service representative!

Shit, what now? We quickly went to the other counters advertising our route but all buses were full for that night. Eventually a rather more helpful chap at Frontera Del Norte buses confirmed that our Pullman bus was definitely cancelled, explained that it was a big holiday weekend in Arica but that he had some spaces for the next night on a direct bus to San Pedro. So we bought the tickets immediately to secure the seats, we’d worry about a refund from Pullman later, made a quick hotel booking on Debbie’s phone and set off in an Uber back to the Novotel. We’d met a couple of English lads who’d just rocked up at the bus station around 20.45 hoping to purchase a ticket for one of the 21.00 departures to San Pedro – no chance boys – but Steve told them that the Novotel had rooms for £60. They went white as this was probably their budget for several nights, so instead took a bus to the large city of Antofogasta, 10 hours south, and hoped they could catch a bus to San Pedro from there. A night on a bus to anywhere was free accommodation and potentially beats sitting around killing time – perhaps we should’ve done the same. It was all a bit ‘Race Across The World’ – but not exactly the end of the world – it had cost us some money as we’d pre-paid for our San Pedro hotel on a non-refundable rate, and also needed to pay for an extra bus ticket and night at the Novotel, but it was the first thing that’d gone wrong on our travels and we weren’t exactly stranded. We had a bed in a nice 4* hotel and much needed beers to drown our sorrows. That all sounds rather more calm than the reality at the time though!

After another lazy day, and a bit of pool time, we set off again for the bus station. The man at Frontera Del Norte remembered Debbie from the previous night (God knows what impression she must’ve given) and assured her that the bus was OK and would definitely be departing at 21.45 as scheduled. We decided to pop to the Pullman Bus counter to have another word about a refund, as our booking agent had asked for proof that the bus had been cancelled. The nose-picking-no-help-at-all girl had been replaced with 2 proper customer service agents who apologised and provided 2 email addresses to contact for a refund. We do wonder why they didn’t have helpful people on duty the night before, when they cancelled the bus and people actually needed help. As it turned out, 12Go.com managed to confirm the cancellation and we got a refund within a day or so.

Once safely on the bus we settled into our sleeper seats for the journey that would hopefully get us to San Pedro before 09.00 in the morning. And then at 01.00 the bus lights came on and a siren started beeping – WTF? The bus stopped, we were all herded off, our luggage was offloaded and we had to go through security screening and sniffer dog inspection. Apparently we were at a provincial border and, as we already knew, the Chileans are paranoid about contraband fruit, veg & plants. Back onto the bus we settled down again, the lights went out and we set off. And at 03.30 we had a repeat performance at the crossing into the next province. FFS, the bus hadn’t stopped since the last checkpoint, where did they think any dodgy avocados or apples would’ve jumped onto the bus??! We stopped at Calama around 07.00 to let half the passengers alight, and finally reached San Pedro at 09.00. after the least restful night imaginable. Debbie said to Steve ‘I hope you are done with wanting to use South American buses now’! The only positive was the amazing scenery between Calama and San Pedro, but Steve noticed that his blood oxygen levels had dropped and, on checking the altitude, found that we’d reached almost 3,500m during the journey.

San Pedro de Atacama & The Atacama Desert

Our friend Jayne had visited San Pedro almost 15 years ago and said that when their bus arrived they thought it resembled a one horse town which the horse had left! First impression was that it was an empty, dusty place surrounded by the most surreal landscape, but then our taxi from the bus station took us just under a mile into town and it was like something out of a spaghetti western, with one main street where the road was sand.

We’d opted to stay in the centre of town to avoid any unnecessary exertion at altitude for Steve, and our hotel Don Raul was a little gem – a series of rustic adobe buildings around central courtyards with loads of seating areas in the sun or shade, a huge tree, a gorgeous (but freezing) pool and even a piano. As we were a day late arriving, and obviously looking knackered, we were whisked straight for breakfast, check in could wait, and it was a magnificent spread and even included sparkling wine. Rooms were tiny, and we’d gone for the biggest, but we’d expected that and had decided that the room size – location trade off was worth it.

As we’d lost a day here, so effectively now had only 2 full days, first priority was to get some excursions booked. Many of the highlights of the area are well above 4,000m and so were definitely off limits, but Chat GPT had suggested that there were still sufficient impressive sights around 2,400-2,500m to make it worthwhile visiting. The main street of San Pedro is lined with travel agencies, but we went with the recommendation of our hotel and used Layana Travel to book 3 trips over 2 days. Steve was delighted to qualify for OAP half-price entrance fees, Debbie is still a good few months away and would rather be still in her 50s than save a few quid. That sorted we spent the rest of the day resting in the sun and acclimatising – the altitude was noticeable, not helped by the very dry and dusty air.

It’s the middle of winter in the Southern Hemisphere now, in San Pedro the skies are clear and the days are warm – around 20 degrees – and the sun is strong. But the evening, night and early morning are REALLY cold – our fleeces and puffer jackets were definitely needed, Debbie regretted not buying a baby alpaca hat, scarf and gloves in Arequipa, but was glad she’d brought jeans on the trip. Steve had said that jeans were too heavy and there would be no need for them, but he probably would’ve welcomed a shop selling jeans in San Pedro. At least the restaurants had fire pits and our room’s air-conditioning had a heating mode. Most local excursions are in the afternoon, to give time for sun to warm the air, and our first excursion involved a dip in a lagoon so we definitely needed it to be as warm as possible.

(1) Desert Lagoons – Layana Travel’s tour organisation was impeccable, with a WhatsApp group for our guide to let us know when he’d be arriving to collect us and live location tracking. We were the only English speakers in our small group of 12, but our guide Manu was fluent having lived in Chicago for many years. Setting off into the desert outside San Pedro we were immediately in a landscape quite unlike anything we’d seen before – even though we were already at 2,500m (almost twice the altitude of the UK’s highest mountain Ben Nevis), far higher Andean mountains and volcanos rose above the flat desert plain. The photos will never truly show just how dramatic and awe-inspiring this place is. And remember, we are limited to the ‘less impressive’ sights, so God only knows what the higher altitude ones are like. Our first stop was at Laguna Ceja, a stunning natural oasis with high salt concentration allowing us to float effortlessly in the crystal clear water. It was bloody freezing but very beautiful, and almost as soon as we stepped out of the water and started to dry, our skin began to feel crunchy and was covered in salt. We showered as it’d not be good to leave this much salt on the skin, but Debbie was told off by the warden for using more than the permitted ‘one press’ ration of shower water. A little further down the desert road we reached Ojos del Salar, or “Eyes of the Salt Flat”, two small, deep, circular freshwater sinkholes in the middle of Solar de Atacama. They were formed by underground water dissolving the rock and creating natural pools which have amazing reflecting abilities. We each took our turns to do silly jumping poses while Manu captured pictures and videos on our phones. We weren’t quite as embarrassing as the other oldies in the group – 2 Puerto Rican couples who were more than happy to make fools of themselves. And finally to Laguna Tebenquiche, renowned for its brilliant white salt flats and the best reflections of the surrounding mountains we’ve ever seen. Back at our bus a table had been laid with what had been described as ‘snacks’ but was a rather splendid buffet, including delicious cream cheese smothered in dark honey, accompanied by several glasses of pre-made Sour cocktail. We headed back to San Pedro as the sun set feeling very mellow and very grateful that we’d gone with Plan A.

(2) Stargazing – after a quick snack – or rather a huge empanada from the renowned bakery across from our hotel – we got ourselves ready for the 2nd tour of the day by donning as many layers of clothing as would fit and still allow us to move. We were off into the desert, widely considered the premier stargazing destination on Earth due to its extremely dry air, very little cloud, high altitude, minimal light pollution and stable atmospheric conditions. Many of the world’s most powerful observatories are located here but we were to be using rather smaller telescopes to view the skies. The stars were aligned (excuse the pun) – it was a clear, cloudless night with not much moonlight, so almost perfect. At the site 20 minutes from town it was immediately obvious that this would be a WOW experience – Steve said he’d never seen the Milky Way so visible, and the night sky was absolutely filled with stars. We were given a blanket, led a little way into the dunes (it’s very hard work walking on loose sand at 2,400m), endured having posed photos taken with the Milky Way as a stunning backdrop, before being split into Spanish- and English-speaking groups for an explanation of what was visible to the naked eye.

Our guide used a laser pointer to identify various stars and constellations, such as Antares, the Southern Cross and the arch of the Zodiac constellations. He also pointed out the “dark” constellations named by the Incas, such as the Snake and Llama, formed by dark clouds of interstellar dust that block the light of the Milky Way. Debbie was impressed with her iPhone photos but they really aren’t that good!

And then the telescopes…

Two telescopes had been set up. The first with an optical eyepiece, through which we viewed the “Jewel Box” a cluster of bright “diamond” stars surrounding a red “ruby” in the Southern Cross, and the globular cluster Omega Centauri comprising millions of stars and looking like a pile of fine sand on black velvet. The other telescope used an iPad to create composite images over multiple exposures, with the picture becoming more and more detailed over several minutes. The images sent through the next day were fantastic and Steve definitely had telescope envy – especially when he was told that the telescope was “only” US$2,500. As well as images of the Jewel Box and Omega Centauri we also received images of the Lagoon Nebula, Southern Pinwheel Galaxy and Eta Carinae Nebula.

(3) Valley of the Moon “Valle de la Luna” – another excursion close to San Pedro and at a maximum altitude of 2,500m, and with the same guide Manu as we’d had for the lagoons tour the day before, He was concerned that the trip may need to be cancelled as very strong winds were forecast to kick in mid-afternoon, and the valley was often closed in such conditions. We got in before the wind arrived, but there was a hell of a lot of sand being blown around and Manu gifted Debbie a bandana to cover her mouth and nose. He’d brought Steve a gift too – a special plant good for lung problems that you could sniff or make into a drinkable infusion. Apparently it was perfectly safe & legal and fine to take on the plane. Errrrr, nope, we won’t be doing that – can you imagine the discussion with customs? “I’ve no idea what it is officer but a random hippy bloke in the desert gave it to me”! Anyway, the valley was utterly spectacular and other-worldly. Sand dunes, salt formations, rock spires, canyons and ridges combine to create scenery that is often compared to the moon (hence the name obviously) and is unique even by Atacama standards. Sadly we couldn’t get to Mirador de Kari (Piedra del Coyote), famed in the Road Runner cartoons and one of the best sunset viewpoints in Chile, as roadworks had caused a long queue and we wouldn’t get there in time. Instead we pulled over by the side of the road and watched the sun set behind the hills. It was a partially cloudy day and the sunset should’ve been spectacular. Back in town, we were walking down the main street, disappointed by the sunset, when the clouds above us turned bright orange – Manu had brought us back too soon, but it was actually more special to see the sunset here.

There were a couple of ‘It’s a small world’ moments in San Pedro. While walking down the road someone called to us and it was the two lads we’d briefly met at the Arica bus station, the ones who’d hopped on a bus elsewhere when they couldn’t get one to San Pedro that night. It turned out that their plan was better than ours (to just stay another night in Arica) as they’d reached San Pedro by lunchtime the following day, around 20 hours ahead of us and having avoided a night’s accommodation cost. Obviously the 20-somethings would do far better in Race Across The World than us oldies! And on the stargazing tour a lady asked where Debbie was from after recognising the Scouse accent that’s still there over 25 years after leaving the North West. She was also from Liverpool and had also gone south on missionary work many moons ago – to Bedford, just up the road from where we lived before relocating to Devon.

We spent a couple of evenings in Adobe restaurant eating delicious steaks, drinking nice wine, listening to live music and warming up around the flames of a fire pit, and we decided that we really loved San Pedro and were very sad to be leaving…