Andes from the air on our way out of Santiago.
Jeff and Amber finding our way in Arica.
The Morro of Arica, site of famous battle in the War of the Pacific .
The Church that Eiffel Built.... out of iron.
Inside the Church that Eiffel Built (can't remember its real name...)
Geoglyphs in the Azapa Valley... check out the Kokopelli-type one.
They seem to have a thing with llama...
Golf course in sand... don't forget to pay your green fee.
The intrepid crew...
Map inside the Museo in Azapa... look closely and you'll see some of the places we went.
The Chinchorro Mummies... 7,000 year old family, older than Egyptian mummies.
Eerie look at the baby...
Mask used to shape the skulls and faces of children... apparently the Chinchorro liked changing the shape of their heads.
Cool hat...
Panorama of Cerro Sagrado, site of very impressive geoglyphs.
Model A in Chile! There you go Grandpa...
Jesus standing guard over the city on the Morro of Arica.
Arica from above...
Giant flag + cannon = epic photo opportunity.
It was a really cool flag...
The gang on our newly rented rugged 4x4
Candelabra cactus
I really liked our truck...
Lluta valley on our way up the Andes to Putre
I like driving..
Good thing we didn't take the bus huh?
Posada Taki... cafe/tour company/hostal run by a hippie couple, one of the most interesting conversations over coca tea I've ever had.
Not sure what this bird was... but it was crazy nonetheless.
Mate de Coca
Pukara de Copaquilla at sundown
Alpaca dinner in Putre with quinoa (kinda like cuscus that grows above 3000 meters).
Church in Putre
Lauca!
The three companions in Las Cuevas at the entrance of Parque Nacional Lauca
Viscacha (rabbit like rodent)
Vicuña: wild version of the alpaca.
Herd of vicuña with the peak of Volcan Parinacota in the distance.
More of Parinacota
Turn a corner in the road and see Volcanes Parinacota and Pomerape.
Church in Parinacota
Amber had to play on every swingset we came across...
Another interesting bird we came across, some day I'll try and identify them but I thought I'd upload them for the sake of the bird lovers who might be looking at this..
Another..
and another...
and another... these ones were very common, building nests on most of the lakes we came across
Me with the lagunas de Cotacotani and the Volcanes behind me
Panorama...
Chungara!! One of the highest lakes in the world.
Volcan Parinacota over Lago Chungara... there will be a few of these...
Just a few..
Panorama of Chungara
What can I say, it's a photogenic volcano
Just amazing
Return to Lagunas de Cotacotani after waiting out the storm at Chungara.
After the second rock threatening a fine for trespassing, we decided to four wheel somewhere else...
Lagunas...
Amber getting her feet wet...
Our laguna...
Parinacota at sunset...
...and Chungara at dawn
Yes, that's me...
The refugio where we stayed on the shores of Chungara
Jezzy (short for Jezebel, nicest thing I called her all morning), stalled out at the refugio..
Which led to artsy photo taking.
Vicuña in front of Parinacota
Flamingo in front of Parinacota...
Must.... stop... taking... pictures... of .... volcano....
Once car fixed, moved on to Guallitiri with its church and active volcano.
Smoke rises from the mountain...
The Salar de Surire after an awesome drive.
What a salar (salt flat) looks like..
Dead alpaca on the salar... deeply poetic.
The Termas de Polloquere, where we later returned to take a starlit bath...
Flamingos!
Valley on our way from the Salar to Isluga
Towering over a native lady at the Termas of Enquelgua
The church in the abandoned 'ceremonial' village of Isluga
Volcan Isluga with the church bell tower.
Closer look at Isluga
Like someone threw a kegger for a whole village and everyone bailed the next morning without cleaning up...
And such was the village..
Border of Bolivia outside of Colchane, just walk across, no worries.. (or so we thought)
Talk about border control...
Flag of Bolivia...
The forest of Cacti!
Slightly screwy panorama looking across the border into Chile standing next to one of the cacti in the forest... these things were several times higher than me.
Geysers of Puchuldiza
THE geyser of Puchuldiza.
Jezzy, us, and the Geyser.
El Gigante de Atacama, with Amber there to give it some scale.
The electric plant at the abandoned nitrate town of Humberstone.
The bakery..
And the stadium (with basketball hoops!?!)
More blatant sepia (blame Jeff)
The pool at Humberstone, made out of iron sections of a ship's hull.
Inside the electric plant... like a giant four cylinder engine
The rail system used to haul nitrates.
More of Humberstone.
Part of the processing plant at Santa Laura near Humberstone.
The plant reminded me of a rusted out ship...
Driving through the Pampa Tamarugal on our way to Cerro Pintados (trees with huge roots that grow in the middle of the desert... very strange)
Cerro Pintados... largest collection of geoglyphs in South America (this is only a small part of a couple kilometers worth of hills)
More... look for symbols you know
Now we know where the Chevy symbol came from...
Kite flying on Dia de Patria on the beaches of Iquique.
The epitomy of Dia de Patria..
Where Hitchcock got the idea..
Colegio de Ingles in Iquique
Valle de Muerte outside San Pedro de Atacama
More of Valle de Muerte
Perched looking at Cordillera de Sal
Dune at Valle de la Luna
Why they call it Valle de la Luna
Amphitheater in Valle de la Luna (where Pink Floyd was not allowed to play)
More of the Valle.
At sunset...
The colors are just amazing, even to a colorblind kid.
Oasis in Toconao
The Salar de Atacama
Flamingos on the Salar
Heading up to the Lagunas Altiplanica
Laguna Miscanti
More of it... just beautiful blue..
Paul was here...
Laguna Miñiques
A zorro posing by Laguna Miscanti
The famous bell tower in Socaire.
Ricky Martin (no joke, that's his name) the llama in Socaire.
Artifacts in the San Pedro archaeological museum.
More of it.
Golden goblet.
More gold...
As it turns out, the former inhabitants enjoyed halucinogens...
... and had a LOT of parephenalia.
The high roller halucinogen inhalent tube.
"And now for 49.99 you can own your own set!!"
Church in San Pedro.
Biking back to Valle de la Luna for more... the wind made this a very bad call.
Slippery with rain?! What rain!?!? (average rainfall a couple of milimeters a year)
Inside the salt caverns in the Valle de la luna
More caverns.
More of the Luna in the Valle de la luna.
Biking into the sunset (and boy was it hard)
Sand over the dunes with the Amphitheater in the background.
More of the Cordillera de Sal
The "James Dean picture" a friend took
As the colors begin to change...
Sun goes down over the dunes
As it gets dark before our starlit bicycle ride home (which turned out even more difficult then the ride there)
The Tatio Geysers early in the morning...
More of the geysers..
Check out the spray...
They steamed a lot...
With the mountains in the background.
Blocking out the sun...
The new Jack... (you know what I mean Dad) in the town of Caspana
My new friend... very friendly
Petroglyphs in Chiu Chiu
The indigenous flag
The lago de Chiu Chiu, 300 feet deep with Pacific Ocean fish in it (Pacific is 150 miles away), explored by Jacques Cousteau
Oldest church in Chile in Chiu Chiu
Inside the Church... pews facing each other to help resolve their differences..
No idea where there were ostriches there.
Not sure which mine this was, but from the plane home.
