Day 14 Desert Hotel to San Pedro De Atacama Chile

Another cloudless day in the desert - we all wake before dawn to and get a sunrise shoot out of the way before a quick breakfast.

The proprietor decides he wants a ride on the BMW - funnily enough all the locals along the way like the Beamer. He shows of to his staff around the hotel then we are off for a full days ride through this unique landscape - I feel like I am on Mars; Volcanoes, desert, canyons and lack of oxygen all make this a surreal experience. I point the DR to the south and gun the noisy beast over the ridge and head for the next reference landscape in the distance. Brian was behind me when I left the Hotel, 5 minutes later and I take a quick calculated glance behind me whilst trying to keep the front straight. Nobody behind me - OK wait for five for them to pop over the distant ridge... Ahh there they are, flash the light at them and we should be good, no they go off to the east. I get the UHF radio out and try that but no one responds, so I frantically flick the high beam up and down - finally one of the guys spots the light and they head towards me. 5 minutes later they arrive and we immediately have a confused discussion about who should have done what. We decide the radios will be used and each person will keep the next in site in a sort of single file arrangement.

Our first photo shoot for the day is the famous "rock tree". As we are now veterans of the desert we decide that we will find our own rock tree on a desert less travelled - so we kit up and put our rock tree on the map - Yes sir we were the founders of this one! This is the famous "Catastrophic Quatro Rock tree"

But just over the ridge is the real one - so we decide we may as well take a few snaps just to say we have been there as well.

Now to find the customs office in the middle of the desert, this is not easy at 5030 meters when heads are light. We pass more lakes of all colours, the sand turns into gravel roads and back again as we go over volcanic passes and back onto desert plains a number of times. Finally we climb to an intersection and turn off to what we believe is the customs office. Sure enough at 5030 meters (16502 feet) we find it tucked behind a mountain next to a geothermal plant (in the middle of nowhere). We have to attach a pre made cardboard number plate as the original has fallen of somewhere in the desert. Brian has a dizzy spell at this altitude and impersonates a drunk stumbling backwards before regaining control of most of his faculties again.

Yes that's a real NZ number plate - ask anyone!

The process to check the bikes out of the country goes well. Now to get to San Pedro and check them into Chile for a day. Speaking of "Chilly", we are surprised at how mild the trip has been so far - we have not had to use our thermals once on the traverse - although we did put our gloves on this morning and this afternoon. Bit of a pain really considering the amount of warm clothing we packed.

We travel through more of the same until early afternoon where we reach the last GPS reference and the navigator runs out of route. Its easy from here as the last lakes and Volcanic mountain come into view - I know the border post and main road are just behind the landmarks.

We cross the border with no issues and make the long decent on a Tar seal road from 4600 meters down to 2600. the Atacama desert and the sands storms are visible below us and the climate changes from chilly to warm.

We have no issues with the Chile border except find that the "pig" now has a flat tyre whilst parked up. I think the BMW is trying to say "leave me behind" " I don't want to be an adventure bike, I just want to look cool and do the odd bit of gravel but mostly just commuting on tar seal". Lyall may want to revise his plans with this one.

We find ourselves a comfortable hotel yet rather expensive - being Chilean. Tomorrow Salta  - yes that's right we are dirty, dusty,  been gravelling for 3 weeks and we want tar seal, wine and steaks!! So we opt for a big days ride (460k or so).

The locals are freindly in San Pedro!