Arrived San Pedro de Atacama

Today was our first full days ride and it was nearly 500km on good roads. We left Iquique this morning before 9 and rode down the pacific coast highway for about 200 km until a place called  Tocapilla, then uphill and inland to a city called Calama and finally to San Pedro de Atacama.

The trip down the coast was good, sea on one side and huge barren cliffs on the other. After having lunch in Tocapilla, we headed up into the  Atacama desert. It seems to go all the way to the sea. The roads were straight and pretty featureless, there is a lot of copper mining happening in these parts so mining trucks are a big part of the scene here. As we ventured across the desert towards the Andes the situation becomes even bleaker. It is a close to being on the moon as you would want to be. On the final approach to San Pedro de Atacama, we have probably passed through areas well over 3500 mts and can see Volcanoes and other peaks as high as 6000+ mtrs.

We all arrived safe and incident free. San Pedro de Atacama is a high profile tourist town which we have all day in tomorrow. I have booked to go visit the Geysers in the high altoplano area at 5000mts but i get picked up at 4.45 am when it will be about 1 degree c. I need to go to bed,

Report more later.

Coast Rd Sea Side

Coast Rd, Land side

Place we stopped for lunch - Tocapilla