walk the line

We traveled to Santiago with Ria on a Thursday evening, finally a bus that took less than 2 hours instead of 7 to 22 that we are used to. What a luxury. Ria went to her hostel and we took a subway to our friends place. As Ria was traveling south the next day we met up for dinner later the same night. Yes, dinners starting around 11 pm are totally casual in South-America. Headed to Bellavista patio which is a lovely complex of restaurants and bars.  Headed home around 1 am and who goes to bed that early on a Thursday night, celebrated our first night in Santiago with a bottle of gorgeous red wine.  Before Chile we expected Santiago to be another big city, so thought about stopping by for just a couple days, when actually in Santiago we were prepared to stay for four days, in the end stayed for eight. The vibe of the city was somehow so right and although we chilled most of the days and weren't too productive, there was always so much to do and place

San Pedro de Atacama is a small town on the border of Chile and Bolivia, where it almost never rains. A proper desert with 365 days of sun a year. It is oriented on tourism as the nature is quite extraordinary. Out of all the options we chose to go sandboarding and explored the Valle de la Luna, but one could also go stargazing, biking or horseback riding in the desert or hike any of the nearby volcanoes. Sandboarding was so much fun as the gear was proper and it was quite easy to get the speed up, man I have missed snowboarding, sandboarding gave some of the feels. The Moon Valley is know for the moonlike landscape of dunes, rugged mountains and rock formations. It's a beautiful, easy hike in the hills and caves between the dunes. Make sure to stay for sunset and appreciate the changing colors. Ria cooked us some beautiful Indian food for a couple of evenings. After a couple days we were determined to go to L