After leaving Iquique in the early morning I wanted to make sure not to run out of petrol since I luckily learned from the day before that petrol stations were rather scarce in the North of Chile. Filling up my 2 spare petrol containers was consequently the right decision especially since there was indeed no refill opportunity until Calama which was approx. 390 km away. 70 km above my maximum achievable reach.
The landscape was at the beginning not really exciting but got better and better until I saw on my right hand side surprisingly an unbelievable beautiful formation of mountain ranges. Since sun set was really close the whole landscape got painted in a deep red colour and I spontaneously decided to make a break at an observation platform which revealed a breathtaking view over the “Valle de la Luna”.
I was fascinated by the view which reminded me rather of the moon than of a desert in Chile and I suddenly realised why they call it that name, lol.
After a while one after the other bus was arriving, unloading masses of tourists which made it difficult to enjoy the moment and I decided to leave.
However, not before taking at least one advantage out of the situation when asking a tourist to take a picture of me with the valley and the sunset in the background.
Simply MAGICAL!
