Riding the Paths of the Dead; Too Many Marias; Kaulbach Heaven

After a stunning 11 hour bus ride from Salta, I arrived in San Pedro de Atacama, which is Northern Chile 's most popular tourist destination and a strange place.  The place hosts 340,000 tourists per year and here is the main street-

that main street in a major tourist destination is a dirt road?

Although the place is not cheap, somehow is doesn't feel upscale.  In any case, tours are very popular here and virtually every establishment on the main street is tour agency.  It has to be the world capital of tour agencies.  I was a little concerned that I would not be able to secure some of the tours I wanted but it became more of an issue of which agency and tour to hire amid the myriad agencies and tours.

But at the recommendation of my selected tour agency I started with a self guided bike tour to Devil's Canyon which has you biking through the canyon and then ending at 1000' hike up a small mountain.  It was quite the 45 minute bumpy ride to get out there, but This low cost tour/experience was terrific and a unique experience as you wound your way through the tight walls of a canyon.  The entrance looked like entering the Paths of the Dead from Tolkiens LOTR but I braved it -

Not sure I needed the neon yellow shirt as there was no traffic-

Somehow along the way my  bike lock bounced away and I lost it.  What kind of a bike lock is that?

  Reminds me of Argentine bridge maintenance

In the afternoon I toured the famous Valley of the moon so called as it allegedly !ooks like the surface of the moon.  You can judge for yourself-

The Luna (Espanol) Parc (more espanol) had a formation called the 3 Marias   I have known  one Maria which  seemed enough

You can sand board down the these sand hills and I would have done it but I did not want to embarrass the natives with  my rookie aplomb

San Pedro De Atacama is of course set in a desert and so one is always drinking water and this sign seemed superfluous (the whole place is an evaporation zone from what I an tell)

All of the land is composed of 70% salt, kind of a Kaulbach heaven (we love salt on our food)

 Alas my days of enjoying $6/btl Malbecs have ended and I have been reduced to this in Chile (a vertible shot glass)