We were in the desert!!

... but there were some volcanoes on the edge with beautiful lagoons like this one.

We´ve just spent 5 days in the Atacama Desert in Chile which was suprisingly pretty in a barren sort of way! We saw sand dunes, rugged cliffs and canyons, lagoons, flamingoes and volcanoes.

We also went to see the geysers which we had to get up at 3:30 in the morning for... Not fun but well worth it. They die down at about 6am so you have to be there early to see all the bubbling water (which we boiled eggs in) and huge clouds of steam rising out of the ground. Unfortunately, Sharon was rather unwell that day with a tummy bug and the geysers were at 4300m above sea level which just about finished her off! She had to spend half an hour on the bus with a rather unflattering oxygen mask over her mouth and nose. But she was fine in the end.

Now we´re in Patagonia on the Argentine side of the border. We´ve been here less that 24 hours but we´ve already managed to devour a huge piece of Argentine sirloin steak - yummy! This is not the place for vegetarians!


We´re in a town called Bariloche which is famous for it´s chocolates, so Craig spent the morning (and most of our budget) eating truffles and other assorted chocolates - if you´re ever in the area we can recommend certain places.

Tomorrow we´re off white water rafting (and it´s really cold here!) and then we carry on our journey through Patagonia down to "The End of the World" - otherwise known as Ushuaia. Hopefully we´ll get to do lots more exciting things on the way.

Janie - glad to hear your shoulder is better and Sharon´s tan is starting to fade now we´re in colder climes.

Paul - good luck with the not smoking! (Just think of all the extra money for models!)