10 days, Atacama desert

[chelo5sur]

Hi.
I d like share some pics of my trip.
With my wife Flor and a friend Nino, we rode from Puerto Montt (south of Chile) to San Pedro (Atacama desert at the north)

Many pics,and few words,my english is not the best.

Day 1 Puerto montt - Temuco
We left Puerto Montt capital of the lake district. This is the place where finish Chilean mainland. And also it s the place where begins
The RUTA AUSTRAL , around 1.000 kms of rainforest, rivers, glaciars ... but in our case we were moving to the north ,looking for sun..


ten mn after we left ,we took some showers ,
The lake district is around 200 days of rain per year, almost 2 meter of water

The bridge that sheltered us for a while



later we met the sun and saw a beautiful rainbow



Day 2 temuco - Santiago
we rode 600 kms toward Santiago (chile ´s capital).Unlokely , i lost pics of this day.
it was sunny all day round, and may be too hot for us.





Day 3 Santiago - Guanaqueros
Santiago is Chile `s capital. Around 6 million inhabitants. As it was sunday, it was easy and fast to ride through it.
It was sunny and hot. The Panamericana Highway perfect conditions.

From Puerto montt we rode 1300 kms and finally we met again Pacific Ocean













Nino riding his Transalp




At the end of this day , we camped in Guanaqueros





Day 4 Guanaquero to Bahia Inglesa

In the morning we had a problem with our camping gear, so we spend a lot of time trying to solve it. And we did it.

















they decide to rode just to baiha Inglesa, so i followed and we rent a bungalow



Day 5 B. Inglesa - Antofagasta

the trip Began with a fall . no damages , no injuries














We were fuelling and 4 argentinean riders arrived, we met them for the first time
but was not the last



Next stop Agua Verde fuel station







" THA HAND" A touristic monument in the middle of the desert, may be a "must see"


Antofagasta main square


We arrived around 6 PM to Antofagsta an d we got many problems where to past the night. Finally a good friend of mine, solved us the problems


and a couple of friends of him offered us to stay with them

THAKYOU VERY mUCH TO THEM


Day 7














almost arriving to San Pedro















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this couple were from Germany and the were riding south america. Their next stop Uyuni Salar in Bolivia



















VALLE DE LA LUNA

































Day 9 and 10 were for Coming back to home

just a few pictures
train service still working


this picture is reaching pacific ocean , at Paposo village



another village could be Obispito not sure



we stooped and past the day at La Serena and next day we rode to Elqui valley








This is the last pictures and the end of the trip
Hope you enjoy

[FechFech]

Fantastic pictures, thanks for sharing ! I have never been to South America, I wish I could ride in the Atacama desert some time...

FechFech

__________________________
KTM 990 SMT - for pavement
KTM 690 E - for adventuring
KTM 350 EXC-F - for offroading
GasGas 250 TXT - for serious offroading

[IslandMonkey]

That looks like a great trip. It's a place I'd love to visit, especially by bike.

[calimusjohn]

Thanks for the report. Great photos. We riders are very lucky. We get to meet great people all over the world. Atacama reputation = awesome.

[akadvntr]

Thanks for the photos!

[snatchy]

Thank you for your report. Very nice

[Gooner]

Some truly beautiful landscapes. Thanks for posting and sharing.

[bajarider]

Hermosa Sudamerica.

Gracias por compartir tus imagenes.

Saludos

[Gaston Gagne]

Wow! Beautiful landscapes you have there. Thanks for posting.

[wachs]

Wow - very nice photos, fantastic scenery

[Comrade Art]

Great pics, thanks for posting!!

[Laconic]