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<\/figure><\/li><\/ul><\/figure>\n\n\n\nDay 3 was one of my favorite days. We went to Laguna Chaxa and saw the flamingos! Or Flamboyance, if you will. Nothing particularly exciting happened, just watching the flamingos eat. It was really neat seeing them in \u201cthe wild\u201d and they weren\u2019t as pink as you see at the zoo which made it more \u201creal\u201d. The lake they are in is also in the salt flat, which is an other worldly landscape – seeing the salt composites growing in clusters. We then drove to a town, Toconao for a little hike in Jerez Valley where we found a waterfall to cool off in. Thankfully! I was already semi sun-burned and very hot so this was a welcomed relief! We also discovered that the valley is where people grow a lot of their food since the river runs through it. It was a really cool little oasis to find in such a hot, dry environment. From there, we went to Ojos de Salado – two pools of water, again in the middle of no where desert, but we were able to jump in and cool off. Our final stop of the day was Laguna Cejar – the salt lake where you can float. This was the craziest feeling I\u2019ve ever experienced! Once I picked my feet up my body was buoyant and without effort was able to float at the surface. It was really fun to play and push off each other without sinking. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nOn Day 4 the clouds finally came out! Which was perfect timing. Initially we were going to hike one of the volcanoes, Cerra Toco, but it was full of clouds so we went to plan b – Valle de la Luna. This area reminded us of Moab except there are also sand dunes here. In the valley there are very well laid out primary paths to get people to the overlook but there are secondary paths for further exploring that hardly anyone goes on that allow for some great hiking and the ability to get away from other tourists. We thoroughly enjoyed these other paths that kick-started our inner \u201chiking\/ exploring off the beaten path\u201d mode. After a few days of straight heat and following the tourists, this was exactly what we needed! It started raining that night which was very bizarre given the Atacama is the driest desert in the world. But it rained and snowed on the volcanoes In the middle of summer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nDay 5 is definitely one for the books! Despite the snow, the weather had cleared and we decided to see just how far the little van would take us up the volcano. The hiking trail to the summit starts at an observatory but we were still 2.5 miles shy of where the van was able to go, so we layered up, packed water and snacks and set out. The temperature was good but the sun was strong with the glare! Surprisingly we didn\u2019t feel too bad with the elevation, having started at 15,000\u2019, which is the highest I\u2019ve ever been. We made it to the observatory (17,000\u2019) and even though I wasn\u2019t dying, I just didn\u2019t feel like pushing on. The view from there was already amazing and I felt satisfied with how far we had gone. Tom had a different plan. He was very determined to make it to the summit. Usually when we hike, he pushes me when I\u2019m just not feeling it and I never regret going a little farther, a little higher. But today, I just didn\u2019t want to. Tom kept saying \u201cI promise you won\u2019t regret it\u201d. \u201cI promise this will be the coolest summit ever\u201d My response, \u201chow can you promise that when the clouds are coming over the summit? We won\u2019t be able to see anything anyway\u201d. So at 17,400\u2019 I told him to leave me there with my jacket and water and I\u2019ll wait for him to summit. To which I turned around to get my things and found him on one knee! He said \u201cI don\u2019t care if we summit, but I promise I will always take you to the highest places\u201d. Or something like that. I had already started crying, was trying to breathe and had so many different emotions coming through me. Too bad he can never use that line again to get me to the summit, but of course I said \u201cYes!!\u201d. I said yes to the Cerra Toco summit and yes to the ring, which is a perfect silicone one for adventuring. After that, my adrenaline was extremely high and I was determined to make it to the summit! Tom\u2019s adrenaline was dwindling (having his built up for the big question) so in true form and us hiking and adventuring together, when one is down the other leads the way. So now it was my turn to push us to the top. It was windy and cold as hell, but still absolutely worth it! The view was amazing, and of course reaching 18,400\u2019 with my love was the start to our next adventure together! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Day 1 we arrived in the afternoon and rented a camper van from Wicked Camper Vans which provided us the ability to drive all over…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[13,12,11],"class_list":["post-99","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories","tag-atacama","tag-campervan","tag-chile"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions\/108"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anniandtom.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}