Friday was a busy day, with a tour of the nearby moon valley planned as well as stargazing at night. Despite this we had a free morning so I had a good lie in. San Pedro is a small oasis town in the Atacama desert in northern Chile. It's a quirky little place - low-lying adobe buildings line the narrow streets, leading to a sleepy tree-lined plaza that's home to a pretty white-washed church. I spent the morning relaxing, going out for lunch at a local restaurant which had good wifi and spent much of the afternoon there. San Pedro itself is very hipster and touristy and I liked the vibe a lot.
Our moon valley tour had a 3pm meeting time. The unusual desert landscape of "Moon Valley", just a short distance outside San Pedro, is home to other-worldly rock formations, unusual layer-cake landscapes and huge dunes to combine and create some incredible views. The sunsets here can be
amazing, the changing light turning the stone and sand a kaleidoscope of
different colours. Our first stop was an area full of rock formations where we walked through deep passages and even caves, even having the option to do some challenging sections of scrambling.
We then continued onto an area where we saw this massive sand dune. We couldn't sandboard on it though unfortunately. The views were pretty stunning though. Our stop after that was a short hike to the top of this hill where we got more amazing views. Our final stop was sunset time where we sat on the edge of the cliff, basically the plate boundary because you see your obvious scar in the ground and watched an amazing sunset. Sunset is now like 8 to half 8 so the days are definetly getting longer.
When getting back to to San Pedro we had time to kill before our stargazing tour which started at 12. I therefore went to this local steak house for dinner and had a proper lump of meat which was really good. I then relaxed before heading off stargazing in the desert. We had a very informative guide and the sky was so clear. You could literally see the milky way and he pointed out many different formations out to us which was really interesting. We even had 9 different telescopes set up to view various different stars and constellations. I however didn't get to bed until 3am!
Saturday was an early start, having to meet at 5am for back locker so I didn't get much sleep. With a border crossing, a lot of distance to cover, and our route going straight over the Andes, we were braced for a potential long day. En route to the border a lorry carrying loads of new cars fell over which want great, but we eventually got to the border and it took ages to get through. They basically wanted to completely empty out truck, and wouldn't stamp us in until they had touched everything. They even had dogs and x rays.
When we finally got through we stopped for a roadside lunch a short way down the road. Lunch was empanadas, and we were soon back on the road, not arriving into Salta until like 6pm. Salta is an attractive town in the north west of Argentina. Nicknamed "Salta la Linda" (or "Salta the Beautiful"), the city is well known as being a stunning town in a beautiful area. Home to some fantastic colonial architecture, the old town centres around the main plaza which is lined with cafes and restaurants, a great place to independently explore and soak up the serene Argentine atmosphere. After checking into the hotel we went out for dinner although it was a mission finding somewhere open because I think Argentinians have their Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve which meant everywhere was shut. In the end I found a burger van and just had to eat there.
Christmas day was a free day to explore Salta, although we had booked ourselves a bbq for the afternoon. Breakfast in the hotel in the morning was croissants and hams and cheeses and stuff, and after breakfast we did our secret Santa. I got an Inca Kola t shirt and a headband. We then had the morning to relax before heading out to the bbq at 1, which was at a hostel out of town. It was quite disappointing in reality basically being chicken, wedges, and salad, although there was a lot of it, and obviously the drinks were flowing.
We had the option to go back after the bbq or stay at the hostel and catch taxis back later, so I decided to stay and we played pool and sat by the swimming pool until late, before getting back to Salta at about 10. For dinner I went to McDonald's which was open like most of the rest of the town which was heaving. We then sat in the hotel lobby and it was quite a late night.
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