Chile - "A Natural Inspiration"

Northern Chile - Atacama Desert

An excellent example of the desert's preservative properties is that of the Chinchorro culture, a group of coastal hunter-gatherers who inhabited the Azapa Valley, near Arica. Here archaeologists uncovered a sand-preserved mummy which dates from 8000 BC, making it the earliest known use of artificial mummification in the world. Click on Image for Larger Version

Some of the rain that falls in the Altiplano drains west, into the Atacama Desert. Where it emerges, this water transforms the landscape, creating a trail of vegetation and cultivation, human habitation and wildlife habitat, salt flats and eventually, salt mountains.

These trails of water and life have been recognized and utilized by humans for aeons. San Pedro de Atacama and numerous oases along the río Loa and río Salado served as way-stations on pre-Inca trade routes linking the Amazon, the Altiplano and the coast. These caravans followed desert trails now marked only by giant geoglyphs, the most dramatic of the archaeological remains found in northern Chile.

From north to south, the principal destination cities in northern Chile are Arica, Iquique, Calama, San Pedro de Atacama, and Antofagasta. Of these, all but Calama and San Pedro are coastal cities, with fine beaches where clouds - let alone rain - are never an issue. Accommodations, transportation, and other tourist services are on a par with the capital, and each city provides access to a distinct portion of the desert, sierra foothills, or Altiplano. Trekking, Ethinc and overland tours, mountaineering and archaeological tours are among the most popular activities in Northern Chile.

Near the southernmost limit of the region, the towns of Copiapó and La Serena provide access to narrow east-west agricultural valleys best known as producers of Chile's beloved pisco (grape brandy) and site of the southern hemisphere's clearest skies, which attract professional and amateur astronomers from across the globe.