SANTA FE SOUTH- ATACAMA SOONER OR LATER

The Santiago-Valparaiso nexus lies in the fertile central region of Chile. Below is increasing rain and cold, if not quite Antarctic extremes. Above is increasing aridity, if not heat, to extremes hardly known anywhere else, rainfall never recorded. Roofs are optional in Antofagasta. Somehow it seems strange for such dryness to exist next to the ocean, but that it does, on a cloudy day ocean, sand, and sky blending into a seamless grayness. Fortunately in Chile the sun usually comes out to brighten things up. Farther north in Peru, it seldom does. Fortunately the desert comes in stages. North of Valparaiso to la Serena is some of the most beautiful desert you’d ever want to see. Sonora’s got nothing on this. In keeping with Chile’s metaphor of a far-south California, there are wind farms climbing up the slope from the sea. Unlike California, an evening fog (?) rolls in and licks up the terrain until it whites us out briefly.

By the time the bus gets to La Serena it’s almost 6pm and we’re parked on the outskirts of town, or so it seems. This is a tourist town, but there’s not a map to be had anywhere. There’s a stall for tourist info, but it’s closed. Suburban bus stations are a bummer. You have to make a commitment to a place with incomplete information. It’s nice to hop from place to place, staying if you like, moving on if you don’t. It’s hard to know whether you like a place by looking at a shopping mall in the suburbs. That’s why centrally located bus stations are nice, though the trend is toward remote locations. That’s one thing nice about Buenos Aires, an easy walk into the center of town.

Though it doesn’t get dark until fairly late right now right here in Chile, I decide to shove on. I have to come back the same route, another unfortunate occurrence when the motto is ‘backpack, don’t backtrack’, but that’s the price you pay for your cultural intercourse sometimes. I could either hang around in Vina for a week for a film festival which may or may not be any good, by which time I’d be burnt out on the place, or take a trip and come back. I could also loop through Argentina, but extra border crossings can be laborious also, in time and paperwork and extra stamps in the passport. I get on the bus.

All night bus rides are a challenge. If you’re lucky you’ll be beside an empty seat, though it doesn’t matter that much. I’ve tried all kinds of positions, and the straight old middle of the saddle missionary position usually works best. It gets harder with age, but if you fly around, then you miss the landscape. That’s a big part of the fun, right? You can save some bucks 2. Buses may not be prompt in Chile, but they ARE pretty cheap. Unless some overexcited bus attendant plays videos all night, I can usually do almost as many hours REM as in bed, which probably says more about me than it. If there’s nothing else to do, I’ll study some Arabic; that usually knocks me right out. Don’t do that through border crossings btw. Pick another language, maybe Old Church Slavonic. That’ll f**k ‘em.

The night passes in darkness (doesn’t it usually?) outside. By the time I wake up the lush desert at Serena has become moonscape at Antofagasta. Temperatures hover just above freezing at daybreak on the road to Calama, though they’re around 70F by the time we get there an hour later. It’ll be scorching at high noon in San Pedro de Atacama, my immediate destination. Once a lonely dusty outpost on the Golden Triangle where Chile, Argentina, and Bolivia meet, this is now THE back-packers hot spot in the region. Unfortunately it’s still dusty, but now it’s hip too, with Krishna restaurants and tour guides, the whole nine yards, but not quite a first down, not for me at least. I hate it, reluctantly, this Santa Fe-in-progress. It’s a shame too, because if you could discover it early on, it’d be way cool, a picturesque stopover en route to a remote border crossing. There’s nothing a backpacker loves more than THAT.

But I have a rule of thumb: if a place has more than 50% tourists and/or tourist-industry workers, then I can’t do it. It’s a matter of authenticity, remember? I try to be open-minded, but… naah. I also realize the danger of reverse snobbery, the ‘authentic’ guy acting ‘less-tourist-than-thou’ when faced with people simply enjoying themselves. Does that change anything? Does that mean I’ll be hanging out at Khao San road in Bangkok? I doubt it. I know what I like also. I order a bowl of cazuela in a street stall up by the bus stop while everybody else sips wine or chug-a-lugs brew down with the Interzone people, best soup I’ve had in years. The prices are out of proportion here, too. I spend the night then get back on the bus. Others spend days and weeks, grooving with the groovers. But I stick to my guns- if you want to see the REAL Santa Fe, then you go to Las Vegas NM. If you want to see the REAL Thailand, then go to Laos. If you want to see the REAL China, then go to Vietnam. If you want to see the REAL Atacama, then go to…?

Considering I slept through much of the Atacama Desert on the way up, I figure to go back in stages, seeing what I missed. I already saw a bit of Calama already, so go back straight to Antofagasta. This is copper country. Statues in the Calama pedestrian mall are made of the stuff, and the rail yards are full of it, hammered into crumpled sheets. They only found the stuff after the phosphate trade dried up. I don’t know why it took so long- the hills around the area have a distinct greenish tint. Prices are up, stolen electric wire a big problem now, and the area is prosperous. Antofagasta is more expensive than any place I’ve been yet in Chile, with the possible exception of Santiago. It’s got plenty of bars and strip clubs for the mine workers. It’s even got ‘sexy’ coffee. Huh? It sounds like a trap. Have these people been reading my blog? These are daytime girlie joints with apparently a different set of rules than the nighttime alcohol-based ones. That sounds good to me, though not as weird as the ‘sexy breakfasts’ in Montreal. But there is something even more interesting here- gypsies, a whole family of them occupying the town square.

This is an anachronism and a dying way of life, the act of Gypsies being gypsies. They panhandle and perform little rites and shuffle around bugging people, but other than that the only thing that distinguishes them is their long flowing cheap printed dresses and a general attitude of listlessness. I want to know more, but not TOO much. I know these people’s reputation for sticky fingers. I don’t want to get ‘gypped’ by Gypsies; the idea is to get a piece without losing my fleece. So I let the lady approach me and do me up a little love potion. I need it. She takes some magic powder and asks me for a little piece of paper to wrap it up in. Then she asks me for a banknote to lay it on. I know what you’re thinking, me too- I’ll never see that note again. She does a few ‘repeat-after-me’s, then asks for a larger bill. I get the picture and start to leave. Feigning insult, though I’m sure she’s had much worse, she settles for another small bill and finishes the encantations.

We’re good and I’m outta’ there, she even suggesting I should consider a gypsy woman. Yeah, and they should consider bathing. As I walk away I notice a familiar smell. B-O? No, it’s the magic powder wafting windward, the distinct smell of… guess what? Curry, turmeric, the essence of India with a human vector, mobilized and motivated. Do the Gypsies know that’s their ancient home? They spoke another language to each other besides Spanish, but off my radar. What’s their story? Do they even know? Theirs is an emigration unlike any other, Jew Chinese or Inuit, bound together by ancient ties and uncertain logic. They’re famous even where they never reached. Tarot cards in Thailand are known as ‘gypsy cards’. I wonder why they didn’t head east.