So we spent 18hours on a bus and were dropped off in the middle of the atacama desert- the driest desert in the world. What a cool and amazing place- it has the most stunning backdrop of snow capped mountains. We both loved it here but the main purpose for being here was for booking our 3 day trip into Bolivia- this is one of the launching pads. Steve hired a bike and went exploring to some ancient ruins.

We took another comfy bus for 7 hours to La Serena- really liked it here, lovely place and we met the lovliest taxi driver ever! Hostel was a bit rubbish but it was only for 1 night to break up the journey further north. Huge big mall, the best id seen in ages and lots of nice places to eat.

Valparaiso was a bit of a let down- didnt really like the place much though the houses high on the cobbled streets which it is famous for were kind of cool. It was here that we experienced our first earthquake and aftershocks. A 5.3 magnitude quake hit 45 miles north of us...i was on skype tp mum at the time and the bed just started shaking and moving from side to side and the whole hostel building was then shaking- scary stuff. Luckily all was fine and nothing ...

We took another super comfy bus from Mendoza to Santiago- this time during the day to appreciate the stunning scenery of crossing the Andes Mountains. The border crossing took a while and we had to get all our bags off the bus and wait in line for ages. We stayed in the Bellavista area which is trendy and full of great bars and restaurants. We loved the hostel here and ended up staying 5 days due to the tsunami warnings for chile following the Japan earthquake. ...