Geysers and flamingos Atacama

Rude start today as we had to leave at 5am in order to get to the geysers around dawn when they are at their most active. The road was ok to start with but got more windy and rough as we progressed. We climbed up above 4000 metros and I was pleased I had got started on the Diamox the day before as a couple of the women were badly affected by the altitude including one whose legs were just shaking uncontrollably. The geysers were in a crater and with water under the surface coming into contact with the magma it is forced out. We had a picnic breakfast there the best part of which was the hot chocolate warmed in one of the geysers. We stopped at an
Indian village on Our way back and some people had llama empanadas
- goats cheese was a good alternative especially as we had just been oohing and aahhing at some llamas up
The road. The bus returned us to the hotel around lunch time and I took a sleep - getting into this siesta idea.That afternoon we went again in the opposite direction out of town to the salt flats in particular to see flamingos. We stopped at a village part way where there was a lovely church built by the Spanish of course but with an even older tower built by the Indians as a lookout but now used as a bell tower. The were two lovely paintings in the church painted around 1580. A young puppy we befriended came into the church with us and then hot bored and started pulling flowers out of the display so he was sent out in disgrace. I ate a mound of beautiful apricots bought from a store there for all to share. Not sure why so many people didn't want any. Who doesn't love ripe apricots? The salt flats were not flat at all but looked like ploughed grey earth. Apparently the minerals from the volcanos cause the salt to form a sort of hard aerated form. Anyway there was a visitor centre in the middle of this grey landscape and out from there were some wetlands in which the flamingos were feeding on small shrimp. There were other birds as well including lovely black and white avocets. Strange and beautiful the flamingos caused great excitement when any took off as people tried to catch them on camera with varying success. Lovely day overall.

San Pedro de Atacama

A short flight from Santiago and we are in the deserts of the far north. We arrived in Calama and then went by bus for 1.5 hours to arrive in the small oasis town of San Pedro. The landscape is stark with mountains in the distance and all sorts of colours in the smaller hills around. Peru has many volcanos and we can see many from here; one, a perfect cone, is said to be building up for a big explosion at some stage. Our hotel is lovely with a rustic, Indian look built of local products like pink mud bricks, rushing for the roof and the round rooms like the roundavels in south Africa. Our first outing was around the town which is small and mainly catering for tourists going out to the desert regions. We had a menu of the day lunch for 7000 pesos including drinks, which was excellent. Also went into the local church built in 1534ish which had wooden plank floors and a ceiling built like a ship but using cactus planks. In the afternoon we were taken out to the Valley of the Moon and later Death Valley. We were sand blasted as the wind sprang up and later as the sun went down and the wind rushed through the gorges it got quite chilly.Our last activity was to watch the sunset from a special point and there were a few others there for the same reason. As there were no clouds the sunset wasnt special but it did light up the Andes in the opposite direction with some pretty colours. We had a pisco sour and some snacks up on the view point to celebrate a birthday of one of the women on the trip.

Valparaiso and Vina del Mar

Most of we took an optional tour to Valpariaso By bus which cost 85 USD. It is just over one hour away and the drive took us across the coastal mountains where there were a number of sheltered valleys using irrigation to farm wine grapes and fruit trees. There is a great contrast between the brown steep hills and the flat green valleys. We stopped at a lovely winery making organic wine using chickens and llamas to help fertilize the grapes. We had a wine tasting costing 11000 pesos or say 2.20 Us dollars. Wine very special especially one that has just won a gold medal for their carmenure?? Check spelling for this one which is Chile's 'own wine'.Valpairiso is a beauTiful ciTy with such a long history starting with Spainish settlers in 1534 and being one place that was attacked by Francis Drake who apparently blew up their first church. It was wealthy with the export of nitrate but when the Panama Canal opened and the price of nitrate fell the city declined. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage site and there is work on cobbling streets and renovating old and beautiful houses once owned by rich merchants. The styles are so varied but there is an obvious reference to Germany and many streets with English names reflecting'the influence of large immigration streams from both countries. The most endearing thing is the use of bright colours on the houses and the art work and graffiti around the supporting walls. We looked at a funicular which was called the Victoria and later in the new Gold Coast like Vina del Mar city the horse amd coaches taking tourists along the waterfront were also called Victorias. Lovely lunch in turn of the century building up in the hills and overlooking the bay and the naval base.

Santiago de Chile

My flight from Buenos Aires to Santiago was half an hour late in leaving and on arrival I had to line up with other visitors to pay the 'reciprocity fee' ie Australia charges them to enter there so they charge us (and numerous other countries). The good news was that my transfer driver was still waiting when I got through customs which was almost as strict as Aus re bringing in food and plants. My driver provided a local guided tour on the way to the hotel where the next four groups leaves from. It is the Palisade hotel right in the centre of the city - it is also four star and while my room is warm it is very comfortable. My first day I spent a few hours walking around the local area which has lovely parks and on Saturday afternoon they were full on girl amd boyfriends costing up on the grass and dogs sprawling on the cool grass. In the evening i got a ticket to a ballet which was playing in a theatre just by the hotel. It was a good show and the audience were very enthusiastic not wanting to let them leave the stage. .Yesterday afternoon during a city tour I noticed the temperature was 41C so pretty warm for a Sunday walk in the city. There are 13 people on this new trip, all except one from England and Scotland. One young woman is from Belgium. We went out for dinner in a local restaurant area and were served huge plates which I think could easily have fed two.

Millie reaches Buenos Aires

The last day was a long drive for Raoul who it turned out had driven over 6000 ks over the full trip which started in Lima and went up through Peru to La Paz when I joined up. The drive was through more flat country but much more fertile than we had been though recently. Raoul had to ask the way one last time. Otherwise the drive was fairly uneventful really but with a crazy bit at the end as we entered the city and stopped for fuel and a toilet break we headed off in the wrong direction and Raoul had to get very assertive to get the bus off the motorway and turn it around through rush hour traffic coming off and struggling to get on to the main drag. We got to our hotel with about 10 minutes to spare for those of us going out to the tango show that night. Lindsay managed to delay our pickup long enough for showers and change of clothes so we weren't quite so dusty.The $70 tango and dinner show was great. The food was excellent and there were about five choices in each category. I had a goats cheese and tomato tart followed by prawn ravioli and creme brûlée made with pistachios. The wine and other drinks were included and there was plenty to be had. Our 'girls' made sure of that!Home by bus after midnight to our hotel the Salles which is in a great spot along the 9 Julio boulevard close to the cenotaph thingo.

Mercedes - expectations dashed

For some reason the name Mercedes conjured up a sophisticated and romantic place. Well it certainly was not that. It was a quaint little town which turned out to be the only one of a decent size between Carlos Pelligrini and Buenos Aires. It was a centre for cattle raising and being right in the country it is a traditional place with numerous ipeople wearing gaucho clothes with wide decorated belts and wide flat hats or berets with wide bands worn right down on the head. The outskirts were very depressed and poor with rusting cars and small and dilapidated homes. Surprisingly there was a nice modern hotel close to the town square so we walked around a bit before dinner. There'd was an old and once grand theatre in the town so it has been something in the past - maybe the 1860s but nothing much seems to have happened since. Dinner was at a pizza place again but I had a salad and a water con gas and it only cost 14 pesos - around $2.50! One of the benefits of staying in the country.On the way in to the town we took a look at a spooky place in a nearby settlement. It is a shrine to a man called Gaucho Gil. He was a deserter from some war in the past and was described as a Robin Hood type giving things to the poor (they could do with him now)! Anyway he was captured and hung but before he died he told his hangman that when he got home he would find his son was ill but if he prayed for his soul then his son would be healed. So he was and now if anyone has a sick child they pray to Gil. There are walls of plaques saying thanks and people have given all sorts of strange things including football boots, wedding dresses and bicycles. There are tacky statutes of Gil. To be bought and other souvenirs of one's visit. There is a tree stump painted a blood red from which he is meant to have been hung and the candles and other souvenirs are all in this same colour. I haven't seen anything like it before and it is odd to think that this cult has a strong following even today. There must be lots of desperate people around there I think.