Chile Forum

GJJIM wrote:

Some of us like desert landscapes, and find scenery like that beautiful. Have you seen the night sky in the Atacama? As for Mars, from my point of view here in the USA, it's looking more and more attractive as a destination.

Yes, Patagoniax has spent a lot of time in the Atacama since his first visit in the 1970s, and has seen that night sky while freezing at 4000 metres in the high Puna. If you have the right mobility there are splendid sights to see in the Atacama. In fact I wrote a magazine article many years ago about a motorcycle trip into the Ojos del Salado area east of Copiapó.

The Atacama is the only part of Chile where I have found dessicated human remains lying alongside the road. The associated photo is in my gallery here http://www.allchile.net/chilephotos/dis ... fullsize=1

Regarding our Countryless forum member, his passport/travel/immigration situation is a large enough challenge without the additional burdens of trying to settle in the Atacama. I recall he was looking for a watered fringe area somewhere, but there is so little available decent water. What water there is seems to be both filthy and spoken for, whether for agriculture or the mining industry. And most of the naturally occurring water is downright unhealthy. There is a lot of arsenic that gets into the flowing water in the Atacama, along with other unpleasant chemistry. The Lloa river, for example, apparently has about 60 times the allowable arsenic (vs the World Health Org standards). The Copiapó river has about 50 active mines in its basin plus some inactive mines that probably don't keep their tailings to themselves, and anyway I think the Copiapó river usually dries up just below the city.

I hear that we have to pay a reciprocity fee to visit Mars.