La Salar and the Never ending Atacama.

And here is post two.

So I believe I left off in Iquique.

I left there on Sunday night (25th of October) and made it to San Pedro de Atacama on Monday morning. Found a half decent hostel.

San Pedro is an odd little town. You can tell that it's a desert nowhere village that was surprised not too many years ago by a tourism boom its only recently learned how to handle. There are only two ATMs (only one worked on Monday...) and NOWHERE to cash traveler's cheques. Frustrating!  There are shops selling alpaca everything and restaurants that are rather expensive even by Chilean standards (Chile being one of the most expensive countries on the continent.)

Outside of San Pedro, La Valle de la Luna at sunset

It´s cute, though, for a couple of days. I only spent one there, as I managed to get a spot on a tour to La Valle de La Luna and do some sand boarding the day I got there. The floor of the valley is covered in rocks that are 70 per cent salt, and so it looks white. Moonish, even.

Sandboarding is HARD. Especially on your first day in a relatively high altitude. I'm glad I did it, though. But I´ll do some squat practice before I try again.... yikes.

I secured a spot to leave Tuesday the 27th on a three-day tour through the northern Atacama and the Salt Flats in southern Bolivia. Very cool. We saw lakes that are every colour under the sun, flamingos all over the place and some of most visually fantastic landscapes I have ever seen. We stayed in a salt hotel (outside of the actual salt flat, so it's legal... the one inside the salt flat pollutes too much and thus is illegal.) and I made friends with a young French woman, Eleanor, traveling with her family. It really makes all the difference in the world some days when you have someone to talk with.

Playing with perspective on the salt flats

As of this afternoon, Thursday Oct 29, I am in Uyuni, Bolivia. I have a ticket to La Paz for tonight, so I'll be there by morning. As much as the desert has been a very unique and rewarding experience, I am ready to head back to the mountains.... I don't think I´m a desert girl.

I don´t have many comments about Bolivia yet, except that they speak more slowly than in Chile here. YAY.

Thank you everyone for your comments. Hope you´re all doing well!

S.

Desert life, and Chilean women

I am now in one of the driest deserts in the world... the Atacama. I was in the desert in Iquique too, but it doesn´t feel so much like it when you´re flush against the ocean. The sun is HOT. I´m in the town of San Pedro de Atacama, hoping to do some sightseeing and sandboarding tonight and then head out on a tour across the salt flats to Bolivia tomorrow morning.

I have been meaning for a while to make some observations about Chile.

Sexism is the first thing I´ve got to talk about.

In 2005, a woman was elected President of Chile for the first time. That´s wild in a country where divorce was legalized only the year before. In her term in office it seems she's made some striking changes in the realm of equal rights, but good lord is there ever a long way to go. Chile is a very, very traditional, religious society, as many Latin American nations are. But sexism seems to coat things more than I had anticipated, and I was ready for quite a bit of machismo.

I think what makes the blatant sexism so... blatant... is that Chile looks a lot like home in some ways. The cities here are modern, the people advanced. These are not people who have just never been in contact with the outside. (although for many years Chile was rather isolated) They have a thriving mall culture.

And yet, I wore a skirt that reaches my knees, and the sky could have been falling in Santiago. I have never received that kind of attention, especially in a modern, metropolitan city. Cat calls, hisses (also a cat call), kissing noises. To an extent I couldn't believe. And I was totally prepared for attention, given the red hair. It´s young boys right through to 70 year old men. And they don´t pursue anything, I don´t actually feel unsafe, but they will stop anything they're doing to cat call.

The message I have gotten from Chile, and what I've heard from other travelers, is that a woman here has a role, and she should be sticking to it. I've also heard that while Peru is more traditional and old fashioned, there´s less attention, perhaps because Peru is a country more accustomed to tourism and foreigners.

Someone was also telling me the other day that it looks like Michelle Bachellete will lose the upcoming 2010 election, not because she has done anything wrong, or that she hasn't delivered on her promised (although i am not an expert here), but because she is a single mother in a position of power, and that makes the men here uncomfortable.

If you want to be modern, choose based on something more than gender.

And now I cannot remember what else I had saved up for a rant, but I will continue later. Back to wandering around this desert town!

s.