San Pedro de Atacama – A desert you mustn’t skip!

About San Pedro de Atacama

A short 1-hour drive from Chile’s eastern border with Bolivia, San Pedro de Atacama is Chile’s first big town. With around only 4,000 native inhabitants, the town’s primary occupation is tourism as it plays host to over 250,000 tourists per year.

San Pedro de Atacama is close to slat flats, hot springs, world’s third largest geysers and offers land excursions, beautiful landscape and some amazing restaurants.

If you do find yourself in Calama, do yourself a favour head straight to San Pedro.
Do not bother staying or visiting Calama; it’s not safe & there’s nothing to do there.

Our Experience

We recommend renting a car and exploring San Pedro de Atacama yourselves instead of taking a tour.

Our Boliva guided road trip, left us at the Bolivian-Chilean border and we had a car waiting for us to drive us to Avis car rental at Calama airport. The two hour journey started off on smooth and well paved highways, went through the heart of San Pedro de Atacama, on to another highway with views of the Moon valley and then, finally, into Calama.

Our initial plan was to spend the night in Calama; however, our rental agency informed us that there is not much to do in Calama as its a mining town that that its not safe for tourists to the extent that if we were to stop for fuel, we had to lock the steering wheel and all doors while refueling. This information led us to cancel our night stay in Calama and drive back to San Pedro, which, is much safter for tourists.

We spent the next few days exploring San Pedro de Atacama. Three days in San Pedro de Atacama is just enough to cover everything.

Calle Caracoles

Calle Caracoles, the main street of San Pedro de Atacama, is more than just a street; it’s an experience waiting to be explored. A narrow vehicle-free street around a kilometre long with restaurants, mini-marts and touristy shops on either side, it’s safe and is policed at all times. You’ll find tourists and natives walking on Calle Caracoles throughout the day and night. All restaurants offer free wi-fi and all establishments, including mini-marts & tourst gift shops, accept credit cards.

While in San Pedro, we spent majority of our time here.

Stay: Hard Road Atacama Hotel

An average at best hotel with a location that can’t be beat!

This hotel is a couple of blocks walking distance from Calle Caracoles. The straight road leading to Calle Caracoles is safe and less trafficked, making this location perfect to get to or get from the restaurants after a late night.

If it weren’t for the location, we wouldn’t have recommended Hard Road Atacama because it is next to what seemed like a stable – the smell was unmistakably horse poop. While the rooms were big and accommodating, the decor wasn’t pleasing with appliance, TV, set-top box and air conditioner wires just hanging off the walls; quite a few of the electronics didn’t even work. In addition, while checking-in, the hotel staff asked us to contact them if our room didn’t have hot water and, indeed, it didn’t. From the looks of it, this is a known issue which they either haven’t or can’t fix.

San Pedro de Atacama is a pretty small town and if you have a car, you can get anywhere within 10-15 minutes. So, if you want to walk to the main street, stay here; if you’d prefer better rooms and have a car, don’t.

Stay: Naturalis Hotel

A little pricy but an excellent hotel with friendly staff.

If you have private transportation, we’d recommend staying at this hotel. With only a few rooms, the hotel is small, well equipped and the attention to detail and customers is unpresendented. A little further from town, this hotel also offers unpolluted skies at night for some stargazing.

We went with the “Superior” rooms and they were large, clean, well equipped and came with private patios. On check-in, we were given not only a tour of the hotel but also a run-down of all the attractions in and close to San Pedro de Atacama. The folks at the hotel helped plan our three day itinerary – from the geysers at sunrise to spending the afternoon at the hot springs.

The hotel also provides economical clothes washing facility at $5/kg. Generally, the water in San Pedro de Atacama is hard and salty; so, we recommend washing your clothes in this town only if you absolutely have to.

Naturalis Hotel is equidistant from Calle Carocoles and Moon Valley. You can reach either in around 10-15 minutes.

Valley of the Moon

Valley of the Moon is part of the Atacama desert and one of the driest places on earth. Formed around 33 million years ago, the valley derives its name from its otherworldly landscape with amazing geological formations. The drive in revealed a landscape that we had never seen before – dunes, mountains & rock formations.

The check-in at the main centre takes around 10 minutes and you are provided with a map. The entrance ticket also includes the entrance to Mirador de Kari – Piedra del Coyote for sunset. While, the main centre offers the purchase of water, we recommend that you carry plenty in the car with you – you’ll need it.

We drove the entire length of the reserve, stopped at all locations and did the small hour long hikes, while skipping the longer ones. It’s always hot and dry, so carry plenty of water, sunscreen and sun shade for the hikes.

The hour-long hike at Sendero Duna Mayor is a must. Walking up the dune and through the crater, we were left amazed by the breathtaking and unique landscape.

While, the Mina de Sal hike is unique in its own right, we didn’t find it impressive as we had just done the Bolivian Salt Flats . If we were to visit this location before, I’m sure, we would have been awestruck.

Las Tres Marias, the last stop, was interesting. Made of quartz and granite, these formations are over a million years old and depict images of Virgin Mary in three different poses. We, however, were told by the folks at the main centre to use our imagination to imagine the shapes – from that of a dog to a t-rex. Though fun, not the highlight of the trip for us.

Mirador de Kari – Piedra del Coyote

Mirador de Kari – Piedra del Coyote is a rocky mountain plateau with an overhanging rock overlooking the Atacama desert. The enterance is included in the Moon Valley and this is a must visit location for sunset.

You must reach early to enjoy Mirador de Kari – Piedra del Coyote in solitude and to soak in the views. Eventually, around 20 minutes before sunset, the tour companies will drop of their guests and there’d be hundreds of people trying to make their way to the ledge to find a better view or spot for sunset.

Reach early to find parking and a great spot as every tour company drops the tourists, around 20 minutes before sunset, at this location.

El Tatio Geysers

El Tatio is a geothermal field with as many as 80 geysers. It is the third largest, after Yellostone National Park and the Russion Valley of Geysers, formation of geysers, the largest in the southern hemisphere and, at 4,320 metres the highest in the world.

Geysers are best viewed at sunrise because the contrast between the air and water temperatures creates the most steam. The geysers are best seen “steaming” just as it gets light and before the air warms up. Post sunrise, you will not find the geysers “steaming”.

We recommend starting early around 4:00am to reach El Tatio for sunrise. Drive slow. Drive safe.

Located around 80 kilometres from San Pedro de Atacama, it takes around 2 hours to reach by car. The roads are decently maintained and take you through valleys and mountains with beautiful views. If you are driving for sunrise, keep in mind that so are the tour companies and the tour drivers have to get there before sunrise. More often than not, they’ll be driving fast and will give you little to no notice before overtaking you in pitch darkness. In our experience, it was best to stay behind a civilian car and let that lead car set the pace.

Puritama Hot Springs

After an early morning trip to El Tatio , we got back to the hotel and rested for a few hours before hitting Puritama Hot Springs. Puritama Hot Springs is about an hour away from downtown and is located in the middle of a canyon. As we walked down to the hot springs, we were pleasantly surprised by the beauty of it – the thermal baths are surrounded by 200 feet canyon walls and you are nestled in-between the bush. There are eight baths and the water temperature is between 28 and 31 celcius.

Puritama Hot Springs offers two slots 9:30am-1:30pm and 2:30pm – 6:00pm; we decided to go for the afternoon slot and while it was sunny, it wasn’t too hot outside for us to not enjoy the experience. We were also surprised to find that there weren’t too many people – no matter the bath, we had a maximum of 4-5 other people sharing the pool with us.

The location does have clean restrooms, changing areas and both men and women locker rooms. You are expected to carry your own locks though. Also, ensure that you carry plenty of sunscreen.

Overall, a very good and private experience.

Restaurants

Calle Caracoles has so many good restaurants that you can enjoy a differnt cuisine & vibe every meal.

Every restaurant we went to had free wi-fi.

Breakfast/Coffee: La Franchuteria

La Franchuteria is an excellent option for breakfast. This place, while pricy, serves outstanding croissants, pain au chocolat, sandwiches and coffee. If you enjoy coffee, La Franchuteria is a must!

In the evenings, this place transforms into a bar and, while we were there, had a couple of special events too.

Dinner: Adobe

Adobe is our favorite restaurant in San Pedro. We celebrated a birthday in Adobe and went back again to Adobe for dinner. The menu is elaborate, the food excellent, the bar tender generous and the staff extremely friendly.

You can’t go wrong with anything on the menu.

Lunch: Jardin Meraki

Jardin Meraki, with their open shaded patio, is a great option for lunch. We were entertained by a gentleman singing classic rock while we sipped on some chilled beer and ate some tasty food.

Dinner: Tierra Todo Natural

Tierra Todo Natural is a true Chilean restaurant serving local delicacies for local palate. Our experience there was interesting – we tried this place because of online reviews; however, were so taken aback by how different the food tasted that we eventually left without eating. The place is good, the food is good, it’s just that we were not expecting the food to taste so different or authentic or not suited to our palate.

In other words, if you want to try something authentic to the locality, try this place; if, you are looking more for something thats suited to the western palate, don’t.

Tips & Mistakes to avoid

Yay or Nay

A definite yes! The desert is worth your time and it’s got a bit of everything for everyone!