Our last day in San Pedro, we hired bikes and road north on a dirt road to the Atacamena Indigenous Catarpe area. There are so many cycle hire places here and peak season is over so hire prices are low. We had 2 bikes for 6 hours for seven pounds in total. One of those stray dogs took a shine to us and led the way for us for several miles - he seemed to know all the turns to our destination. We were the first riders of the day at the check point (payment point!...

The lady running our hostel In San Pedro de Atacama owns a toy poodle called Nube which means cloud, this is quite ironic as you rarely see a cloud in the Atacama Desert. We started another cloudless day (not counting Nube), took a stroll into town to take in the sights and shop for lunch and dinner including the 'booze' shop which had so far alluded us. On the way back to our place I spotted a hostel with a car grill outside and a table made from a car engine....

From Vicuna we headed to La Serena to catch a night bus to San Pedro De Atacama - in the desert! The bus ride started fine but during the night they put the heating on and it was like a sauna - too hot to sleep. I went to look for the conductor to complain but he was locked away in the driver's compartment, so we just suffered. We got in to San Pedro at 8am, our hostel was just a short walk away from the bus terminal bus was all locked up. I was ready to just l...

We made the most of what Elki Magic in Vicuna had to offer. We hired bikes, Adeline briefed us on their recommende route and supplied detailed maps, her husband Lincoln drove us out to Pisco Elqui for us to ride back to Vicuna. We met Hendrik and Francine from Canada who were also being transported out to cycle back, but were being dropped off at Alcohuaz further out than our start point. Even though the Elqui valley has only a handful of days of rain per year,...

We had a 7 hour stop in Santiago between buses, we found a food hall near the bus station and settled in. We were pestered by a never-ending procession of people trying to flog us all sorts of rubbish. They patrol the food hall putting items on every occupied table and return 5 minutes later in hope that you will buy them - plasters, candles, metal sculptures, plasters, chewing gum, headache tablets, plasters again. When will the plaster lady get the message we...