South America takes it's bus travel really seriously. Its like checking in at the airport, checking in your baggage, showing your passport, being recorded on video (anyone know what thats about?!), being allocated a specific seat with pillows and blanket, being fed all meals, served by your own 'in flight' attendant! Its great!
After 24 hours on the bus, watching English movies, dubbed over in Spanish, with English subtitles, we arrived in San Pedro De Atacama in Northern Chile. The scenery from the bus was mostly desert. I didn't realise how much desert there was in Chile... I imagined it all to be mountainous. Nope. Sand, more sand, and dodgy looking chemical plants. When we arrived at the bus station in San Pedro we were approached by a few touts, but nothing like in Siem Reap... these Chilean's were much more chilled out. Lovely.
We took a stroll through the town to find some food. It reminded me of the wild west movies set in Mexico. Dirt and Dust blowing everywhere. Walls seemed to be made of mud and straw, some whitewashed over. It was such a relaxed town. We didn't speak any Spanish... so we had to rely on making random orders on menus. I ended up with a chicken leg and reena a veggie omelette. Not a bad start. The town was well catered for tourists too - a souvenier market, streets were lined with guesthouses, tour offices and cafes, yet life still seemed to be going as a slow crawl here.
This is the Main Square at its busiest!
Our original plan was to head into Southern Bolivia from here, spend a week or so in Bolivia to make it to Cusco for the start of the Inca Trail. Well... due to a small amount of bad admin, we suddenly realised we had to be in Cusco in three days! The mammoth bus journey was about to start. We checked out of our hotel that morning and went and sat in the main square waiting for our bus to depart that evening...
Reena with all our gear.
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