San Pedro de Atacama!!

Hola!!!!
I am back from San Pedro de Atacama!!!! And it was an adventure!!!
We left last Friday morning, our bus from Vina to Calama left at 8:30am. My mom told me it was a 12 hour bus ride, the guy at the bus station when we got our tickets said it was 18, when we got on the bus we found out it was 24 hours.... LONNNNG!!! I had paid extra ($15 each way) to sit "first class" which meant we had seats that reclined almost 180 degrees! When we found out the bus ride was 24 hours we were SOOOO glad we were able to get those seats (there were only 9 semi-cama chairs and 10 of us, and when we booked our tickets only 7 seats were avail...) anyway after some sleeping and eating and movie watching we got to Calama at about 9 am. the bus dropped us off at the mall and then we had to go find another bus to take us to san pedro. so we hopped in some taxis and went near the "centro" to a random side road and there was a bus station.... so we got our tickets to san pedro (we had JUST missed the 8:30 bus, and the next one wasnt until noon....) so we explored a little, sat around and finally got on a bus that looked like it hadn't been used in years. there was dust everywhere the seats were a mess and there weren't even seats for everyone, the oversold the bus!!! it was crazy (only $5 to get there though). an hour and a half later we were dropped off in the middle of nowhere... aka san pedro de Atacama (its fill name is san pedro de atacama, all the roadsigns say that and everything its kinda weird, why not just shorten it to san pedro??). after asking about 5 people where our hostel was (which was a little scary because its this tiny town in the middle of nowhere, i would think everyone wouldknow everyone and where everything is...) we walked about 10 minutes to our hostel and checked in and setteled down. we looked into some tours that the hostel offers but decided to go into town to explore and eat and such. somehow there was a big miscommunication and the lady at the hostel thought we said we wanted her to book us a tour... fine, except she wanted $30,000 (aka $60) for one tour, we talked to a guy, got the same tour and two other tours for the same price... (because we were a group of 10, he gave us one tour free and such) but the hostel lady wouldn't let us back out because she already started making our lunches and already filled up her tour bus and gave her other tour away.... sooo after a lot of negotiating and angry and calling the lady in charge of our program for advice (mama vivi) we were able to get the hostel tour down to half a day for $15,000. but we lost the free tour with the agency (the other 2 tours ended up costing us total 20,000) and a private van etc. ohhhh welll. that was all saturday. it was a LOOONG day!
Sunday we went on the hostel lady's tour to these springs (lagunas) in the salt flat. it was fun and really cool, but we were all a little bitter cuz we could've done the same tour w/ more included for less (dang Gringo tax....). we sawm in this FREEEEEZING salt spring but it was sooo clear and sooo salty and the top 5.5 feet or so were ice cold but below that the water was heated by hot rocks/lava! it was crazy! and COOOOLD!!!!! sunday night we came back, made some dinner, watched a movie, talkde with the germans that were staying at the hostel also (talked to germans in spanish! it was soo neat to communicate in something other than our 1st languages... (although they spoke english better we spoke in spanish. and we had commented on how cool it is that they know 3 languages and they said well you guys dont need to know anything else, everyone speaks english... boo that was discouraging and no good).
Monday morning we were picked up at 4 am to go to the gyesers. SOOOO EARLY! THe gyesers weren't quite the same as one imagines at yellowstone, they mostly just steamed and you could only see the steam and such early in the morning before it got hot. so when we arrived at about 5:30 or so it was -11 degrees Celsius!!! COOOOOLD!!!! by the time we left around 9:30-10, there was no more steam.... the region is volcanic so this frozen underground river gets heated by magma/hot rocks and steams and bubbles and hence the gysers. from there we headed slowly back to town and eventually got back at about 1:30 (we were supposed to get back at 12? or 12:30!?) we had another tour that started at 3 so we rested up a little had some lunch and then a van came and got us for our valle de la luna tour. that was reallllly cool! it was sooo pretty!!! i think the craziest thing of all was that we saw SOOOO many different ecosystems/terrain in one day! we watched the sunset and the colors change and then headed back. had some dinner and went to bed early.
Tuesday was just a lazy day. got up and had breakfast at the hostel, laid around, went into town for some shopping and more exlporing (although there really isn't much to explore in town after the first day...) and then went back for lunch and a nap and walked back for dinner. watched a movie and went to bed because our bus was leaving to go to calama at 8 am.
let me tell you a little about san pedro... it is a tourist town. thats really the only reason its there/still exists. chile is in a big energy crisis and san pedro seems to feel it the most. they turn the electricity off at 1 am until like 6 or something, in the entire town. but they also got a new generator not too long ago and they have been having problems with it, so they ration the electricity by shutting off the power in certain sectors of the town at certain times... so tuesday night after dinner, the sun was down and the power went off at about 7:30 or 8... the lights in stores, the streetlights, EVERYTHING! it was craaaazy! in a town with nothing but open desert it gets REALLLY dark, we were walking home and could hardly see a few feet directly in front of you! it made for some incredible star gazing... after about an hour or so the electricity came back on, but the electricity in our sector (by this time we were back at the hostel) went off... and then when it came on, i managed to blow a fuse and we were back in the dark. then finally after some worring we got the lights back on! hurrah!!! but alas, someone else plugged something in and we were BACK in the dark. hahahaha awwwwesome! this time they knew where the fuse was and we got the power back sooner (still like yet another half hour without power... but thats okay). Another thing about Chile- they dont have indoor heat OR water heaters like we do. They have these things called calefonts and you light them when you want hot water and then turn it off when your done (it involves gas, fire and is outside). My family got an automatic one the week i arrived so i haven't had to learn how to use it or anything, it just lights up when you turn on the hot water side of the faucet! its beautiful. Well our hostel had these automatic ones also. HOWEVER, they didn't really work. showers would consist of a few minutes of FREEEEZING cold water and then a few minutes of SCALDING water. and on top of it, the shower head was hand held that didn't stay in place. so IF you could find a decent temperature for long enough get wet, you had to hold the shower head... hahahaha it was quite an experience and made me appreciate my showers here a lot more. (which before i left i thought were cold and kinda weak...)
anyway I just made empanadas w/ my mom and sister for lunch. i LOOOOOOOVE empanandas!!! dont worry ill make some when i get home. and some of the people in the group want to go to "sporting" (aka a sporting club, but if you say sporting like an american they dont understand so you have to say it sport-ting and add an accent) hahahaha for the holiday, sporting has an official ramada there! but my brother just invited me to do something with them, but im not sure what... hahahahaha so im going to try to do both, i want to check out the ramada and then hang with the fam since i've been gone for a week. plus there are like 4 tortas in the fridge and rumor going around about this torta called "leche nevada" that apparently is incredible- entonces i need to be around for once! empanadas and cake!? i looooove the 18th! hahahahahahaha
buenas tardes!!!!! y felices fiestas patrias!!!!