The Driest Place on Earth - The Atacama Desert - you don't have to worry about weeds, nothing grows here

The La Portada Archway on the Chilean Coastline

 

In the North of Chile  

 

Solar Power, Wind Power, Electric lines - harvesting energy in the Atacama Desert

Driving and mileage update

For the last three days, we've been drifting across the Atacama Desert - the driest place on earth.   The average rain fall in the region is just one millimeter per year. As about the thickness of the wire on a paper clip.

 

There are some weather stations in the desert that have never reported any measurable rainfall. It is a place inhospitable to man or beast, or vegetation for that matter.  Nothing grows here.  It's about as bleak as you can get.

When you get far enough north in Chile, the wonder of Patagonia turns to dry, arid, parched landscape. But it has its own kind of beauty, and there are still big moutains, and a lot of space.  You have to drive for hours and hours to get anywhere. 

Check out these two cars (among many) who met their ultimate fate in the dry Atacama Desert.

  

 

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One thing of interest was the harvest of energy in the desert.  This means solar and wind power.  There were hundreds of windmills.  And huge solar farms.  

 

So in order to access this generated electricity, they have to string massive power lines on big towers, and they were building them along the roads out there.  We saw them assembling the towers - the workers looked like little ants climbing up the frame. 

 

Speaking of roads, for most of the trip through Chile, we have been driving on I-5.  The Panamerican highway is Ruta Cinco or Hwy 5, known to most of us as I-5.  We will take this road pretty much all the way home to Oregon. 

 

And we have covered some ground.  At this point, as we find ourselves in our last stop in Chile (Arica), we have traveled over 8,175 kilometers - which equals real close to 5,000 miles.   

We just crossed over the Tropic of Capricorn, to which there was a monument built, and we stopped and got the picture.  It seemed like the right thing to do.

 

What exactly is the Tropic of Capricorn?  Well, it's the ... umm ...line is that defines the tropics ... hunh?  There is also a line in the northern hemisphere (which we will eventually cross on this trip) that defines the Tropic of Cancer.  They're kinda related to the summer and winter solstice ... and other stuff ... clear on that?

 

We are at day 35 in our travels since leaving home.  We turn in our little red truck tomorrow and catch a bus to Bolivia. 

 

This little truck, a 4wheel drive diesel with crew cab, has been through some real tough terrain.  Just today we crossed over about five mountain passes, with treacherous roads over canyons four thousand feet deep, with no guard rails!  Driving along the edge of a sheer cliff as deep as the Grand Canyon with nothing between you and eternity, is waaayyy outside my comfort zone.  It was nerve racking.  There are some really dangerous roads in South America ....

On the way north, we eventually came through several big cities - they are far apart.  One of the cities was Antofagasta, with a nice plaza in the center of the city. 

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Last night we were in Iquique, (Ee-key-kay) on the Chilean coast, after a long day of driving. Fortunately this day of driving was along the spectacular coast line of Chile, with wonderous sites around every corner.  The photo of the arch at the top of the blog was taken on this road.

 

 

 And then magic happened!

 

We went out for a meal and were kinda tired and walking back to our hotel room, when along came a parade!  It was noisy and high energy.  It was a procession of dancers in town for a hugh dance celebration.  So we followed the huge party, which ended up in a plaza right by our hotel room.  We stayed and watched the dancers into the night, it was super fun.  They were doing folklorico, or folk dancing from Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Ecuador, Peru, and of course Chile.  These are the surprise moments that some pretty special travel memories. 

 

Our hotel room had a great view!

 

And when we finally got to our hotel here in Arica, it's a funky but creative boutique hotel right on the beach with the ocean not 20 feet from our door. I can hear the waves crashing in the sunset as I write this blog post. 

I captured this photo of Fiona without her noticing as she watched the sun set over the Pacific.