After I picked him up from the airport, we came back to my apartment and opened up his suitcases like it was Christmas morning! My wonderful mother had packed one full suitcase of all the things I've been missing: refried beans, vegetarian chili, rice cakes, red and black licorice, Crystal Light, and my favorite hooded sweatshirt. Weird things, right?
The next few days we did a lot of walking. I took him to the top of Cerro San Cristobal (the one with the Virgin Mary statue), Cerro Santa Lucia, and to the "nice" part of town. Saturday night we met up with the Fulbrighter crew and had some wine and went dancing. It was really fun to have them finally meet Austin because I talk about him so much. Looking back on our time in Santiago I realize I spent more time introducing Austin to the people I interact with than the "must-see" locations. Hopefully he didn't mind. For example, on Monday afternoon Austin came with me to spelling practice with the cute 5th graders. I think the girls were a little nervous about spelling in front of him, but they did a great job!
Austin noticed right away the amount of air pollution in and around Santiago, but we were lucky to have a rain shower on Sunday that made for a great view from the top of one of the hills:
Wednesday we started our big trip up north to the desert! It was a lucky thing too, because I basically flipped a coin between whether we should go north or south and we would have been majorly disappointed by the volcano. Our flight left Santiago in the afternoon on Wednesday and we flew up to Calama. From there we took a bus to our final destination in San Pedro de Atacama. The map below gives you an idea of where we were at.
Our first night we arrived at 10:30pm and only had time to grab a yummy dinner. The next day we met up with two Fulbrighters who live in San Pedro and they recommended some excellent tours and places to visit. We went on a bike ride to some ruins not far from the town and learned about some of the landscape. Apparently oceanic fossils have been found in the hills around San Pedro and it's conjectured that these mountains were once on the ocean floor. Here are a few pictures from our bike ride:
Friday was our only full day to go on tours so we made the most of it! Our day started at 4am with our trip to the Geysers de Tatio (see map). From San Pedro it was about 3 hour ride in a bus to the geysers which were at an altitude of 13,000 feet--over 2,000 feet higher than the summit of Mt. Hood. We arrived just as the sun was starting to rise and it was a breathtaking sight. The only problem was that it was 12 degrees outside and we were freezing! For those of you who have been to Yellowstone, the main difference I saw was that these geysers had more steam and less shooting water. There was also a large thermal pool that some people were crazy enough to swim in!
We made it back to our hostel around noon and had about two hours before our next tour. So we ate a delicious lunch of pears, cheese, crackers, and wine and then headed out to the salt flat. This tour was only an hour away and took us to the Salar de Atacama. A few facts for you folks who are curious: the Salar de Atacama is the most profound salt flat in the world and is home to three different varieties of flamingos. When I say profound I mean that in Salt Lake City the salt you walk on is at a depth of 5-8 meters and the one in Chile is at a depth of 1,300 meters. So incredible! We walked around for about an hour and had the chance to see a beautiful sunset. It was the most stark, yet stunning landscape I had ever seen in my life. And unfortunately, my photos do little justice to the beauty we witnessed.
After San Pedro, we only had one day in Santiago before Austin headed back to the States. Karina and her family picked Austin and I up from the airport and took us back to their house so Austin could meet baby Agustin. He is Karina's brother's little boy who was born the end of May and is so precious! The reason why everyone wanted Austin to meet baby Agustin is because they have the same name....or at least that's how it translates. It was a fun night filled with lots of translating.
Bringing Austin back to the airport on Sunday night was really difficult, but I'm so happy he was able to visit me at all. The nice part is that we made it through the longest stint of not seeing each other and August is right around the corner! Now I just have to wait for Megan to get here. :)
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