SAN PEDRO DE ATACAMA (CHILE)

Hi, this is the transcription of the video you will find in this link.

http://www.bbc.com/travel/video/on-the-road/20130422-on-the-road-san-pedro-de-atacama-chile

Unfortunatelly I am unable to upload the video but if you print the text below and open the link you will be able to follow the text.


Transcription:

Hi, I’m Greg Benchwick, I am on a lonely planet traveler right here in this  site  here in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile.

The Atacama Desert is the driest desert in the world, as you can see we are in a bit of a sandstorm right now.

San Pedro over the past 10 years or so has become a sort of tourism megadraw, and it is no surprise really, there are volcanoes, masses of sand dunes to visit and of course the world’s highest geysers fields.

The adventure begins tomorrow at 4.00am.

Got up of bed, right at four in the morning at the frightening hour of four and here we are at 4,390 metres above sea level that is about 13,000 feet for you Americanos out there.

As you can see all around as the sulphuric vapours are rising up into the air, people try to get here early in the morning so they can really see the vapours well and appreciate it . There is smoke coming out of just about everywhere, throughout this part of Chile you are going to see an amazing amount of geothermic activity and all of the towns around here actually pipe in hotsprings water and then you got to bath on your own hotel room in a hot spring.

I skipped the “barro” mud treatment, these pores don’t need anything baby!

So a lot of people think that being  a lonely traveller planet rider is all about sitting in hotsprings and drinking cold cervezas but I tell you what, I only do that about 50 % of the time, the rest of the time I’m working my butt off.

So we are here in the tiny town of Machuca. There is this really amazing thing going on here where they are starting to implement rural tourism and you can go to all these tiny pueblos outside of the din of San Pedro. At night you pretty much have the town to yourself and be able to really relax and feel that Indian spirit.

So I’m on my way to the top of the dune “El Valle de la Luna”. It’s a bit of a strange climbing specially this altitude but well worth it for the great  sunset I’m about to see even if I have to share it with 800 of my closest friends.

Saint Pedro is famous for its energy, a lot of people says is caused for the concentration of the copper in the region. But I think it’s just the desert, there is something magical like every desert in every desert in the world. And the Articama desert has this very open moonlight field to it. It’s absolutely amazing, it brings you feel n and keeps you surrounded in warmth.