San Pedro de Atacama is a small but very touristy desert town in the North of Chile. The town is full of tour offices with all the different tours to see the beautiful desert landscapes, oddities like little round lakes in the middle of nowhere, sandboarding, horseback riding, stargazing, geysirs...The thing in SPDA is to do tours, and many of them. We had about 4 days and we chose the most interesting things for us: sandboarding and night sky observing with Lee, Nick, Kristin and Sarah, swimming in the salt lake that is even saltier than the Dead Sea and horseback riding.
Sandboarding was great fun but hard work again (walking up the dunes in the scorching sun). This time at least we had proper snowboards with bindings and all, unlike in Brazil. After some 5 times of hiking up and riding down (like the wind!) we were done and enjoyed a beautiful sunset on a hill top with pisco sours and crisps. Perfecto!
Getting ready for the sandboarding
Nick and his board
The cover of the Sandboarding magazine
Tired riders
Beautiful, happy, exhausted and sandy Kristin
Our excellent group
Sand all over the place/face 
Pretty valley
Sketchy edge
Pisco sour cheers
Inka "Flash" Holopainen ;) 
Chris and the jump In the evening at 22.00 after showering all that sand off we headed to a meteorite museum next to our hostel. The museum was established by a young Belgium guy who was extremely excited about these space rocks, telling us stories about them and showing amazing pieces that he had found himself. Really inspiring! After the museum we went to our Belgium guide's backyard and started learning about the use of telescopes. We set off to find different stars and planets with these delicate but powerful machines. Wow! It was so incredible, all of the stars and planets but especially Saturn!!! We saw, with our own eyes the rings of Saturn. I could truly become a space nerd! Only problem was that it was impossibly cold and in the end everyone was freezing. The tour was supposed to end at 1.00 am but only at 2.30 am we started heading home :D
Happy space fans
Super telescope and our super guide 
Bonfire eveWe had a day when we did absolutely nothing. And then a day with horseback riding in the nice landscapes, actually next to the only river around, a kind of an oasis in the middle of the desert. My horse was the type to be in the lead, all the time and no other horse was allowed to pass. Chris (or his horse to be exact) tried to overtake a few times but mine would notice quickly and immediately started running in front. It was nice to be riding after a loong time and the best part, as always, was the galloping! One feels so extremely cool galloping through those sandy roads although I can imagine that to an outside observer it looks more like a silly westerner jumping uncontrollably up and down on a big horse's back haha.
Helmets!
I should probably always wear a helmet
Riding in the river
Milkshakes and relaxing afterwardsThe same day in the afternoon we hopped on a tour to the salt lake where we got to try swimming aka floating on the "Dead sea of Chile"! It felt incredibly strange. One had to be careful not to get any of the water into the mouth or the eyes. All the little wounds would also burn nicely. After a short while in the cold pond we tried to shower the layer of salt off but it was trickier than I thought. One could also try to get rid of it in the next little round lake where we headed afterwards but I was too cold for that. Chris jumped in happily and soon we continued again to the closest salt flats with some water on top. This created an impressive sight with reflections of the mountains and the setting sun.
Salty lake
Perfect beach in the middle of the desert
Sticky stuff
JUMP
Saltflats and water
Double Chris
Happy SPDA fans
Triple sun
Next day we hopped in a bus towards Salta and it took the whole day. We slept one night in a nice hostel in the center and continued with a plane to our dear Buenos Aires in the morning. In BA we had not planned much to do: mostly we walked around and did some last minute shopping, took care of some boring internet business and such. We did go to check out the bouldering gym (http://www.caba.org.ar/) in the center and wow it was quite nice! Very simple, but it did have some marked routes, and the people were great: helpful and social, like back home in the cave ;) One worker had a laser pointer and he was showing us always the next hold with that (so smart! So much easier than the constant "ööö there's a yellow jug, on the right, kind of round, ööö it's like right there, next to your nose..") I felt surprisingly strong even though I knew I wouldn't be climbing very hard back home. The thought made me sad but I decided to start training tough when back to get my strength back to the same level as it was before the trip. Motivational climbs in BA, I would say.
We also had the pleasure to meet our friends Julio and Romina and their newborn son Dante! Dante was only 5 days old which made him probably the tiniest baby I've seen so far. It was wonderful to meet them and hear about their happiness. Afterwards we enjoyed dinner with other wonderful people, Elina and Gonzalo whom we met for the first time 4 months earlier, in BA. It really is a shame that we live so far apart but I have to say I was incredibly lucky to meet them and I'm sure to see them again.
And then it was time to go home. The flight did a brief stop in London and soon we were in Helsinki, the time in the air felt like it was flying by so fast (haha). My dear mother was there to pick us up and happily we headed home. Home sweet home!
Travelling is adventure is <3 br="">
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