Looking down on the AndesFlying from south to north along the Andes to Calama, the window on the right side of the plane can see the majestic Andes stretching across the length and breadth of the mountain. Depending on the height and orientation of the mountaintops, the snow cover varies from thin to thick.
This street is the most prosperous street in the town of San Pedro. Basically every tourist who comes to the town will visit this street, either to eat, shop, sign up for a tour, or gather. You can find it on this street All the goods and services you need. I walked up and down this street ten times a day during my stay in San Pedro. This street is crowded with people during the day, but it is still lively and noisy at night, and it is still crowded at ninety o'clock.The houses in the entire desert area seem to be so low, made of unknown materials of mud or rocks. If the outside is not painted white, it will show the original yellow earth color, perfectly blending into the monotonous colors around it.Who can save the poster’s short legs?Small town handmade marketWhen we visited almost every shop on the street, we found that all the shops sold basically the same handicrafts and souvenirs. There are many people shopping, but few buying. I don’t know who these dusty souvenirs are sold to, and how the many stores make a living by selling these goods.I have now passed the stage of buying all kinds of souvenirs. In the past, when I bought them, I found that they were dusty and took up space. In addition, many small commodities in many places are made in China. For example, last year I bought them in Seville, Spain. Leah bought a scarf made in china. Every time I open the almighty Taobao, I feel like I can buy things all over the world.
The restaurant near the bus station on the east side of the town is full of passers-by.The only small square in the town, with a church on the west side, a suspected "city hall" on the north side, a row of cafes and restaurants on the south side, with many people sitting under umbrellas eating and drinking coffee, and a row of shops on the east side .Nam-myeon restaurant and cafeI have seen too many churches in Europe, tall and majestic, exquisite and delicate, with various styles and characteristics. It is rare to see such a concise and concise one. Plus this is in South America, I am curious to think about it. See the difference. Unexpectedly, there were some localization improvements. In addition to the Catholic Mary, there was a local deity. You see, even if religion wants to develop in a place, it must be localized and transformed, let alone products that do not have the function of brainwashing.On the day I left the town, since I still had some time, I wandered around the streets in the center of the town many times and expanded around them. There are some construction sites in all directions around. In addition to road construction, they should be mining.
During the drive, we occasionally stop at one or two small villages. There are very few locals in the village, but some houses and buildings suggest that this is a human settlement.
This earthen house is a church with a long history. The tour guide said that only the ground is still left over from the past. The parts above the ground were rebuilt later, but I feel that this reconstruction may have been a long time ago.In another small town along the way, there is a clock tower in the center of the town. It is so mottled that it must be quite old.Apart from the elderly and children, young people are rarely seen in the town. Just when I had nowhere to hide under the scorching sun and was about to find some shade to rest, I met this driving couple. The woman had just gotten out of the car and was opening the door. This modern car seemed a bit inconsistent with this ancient low-rise house.This Adobe is a restaurant recommended on Lonely Planet, and some Chinese people have also recommended it in their travel notes. However, after eating it, I felt like what the hell is this? It is not worth recommending at all. It is expensive and average. Comparing several restaurants we have eaten at later, the taste is not worse than this one, but the price is only half of it. Most of the reviews on lonely and owl are given by foreigners. A friend of mine who is a foodie said that if you give Wai Guoren any food, as long as it is not miserable, they will comment "yummy...delicious..." However, the artistic young people who recommended this restaurant on Qiongyou.com made me think that the comments of the artistic young people posing for photos in the future should also be treated with caution.
I had heard about Chile’s pisco sour for a long time, so I ordered a glass of it for my first meal there. After one glass, I felt dizzy and felt a little sluggish just sitting there. The poor version of Adobe actually cost 40 to 50 yuan a cup, which was more expensive than the bottle we later bought in the supermarket.
Maybe it’s because the town is hot most of the time, and only winter nights seem different from most of the time. Most of the restaurants here are a combination of open-air and indoor, without a complete enclosed space that can keep warm (but Waiguoren is also popular in winter) They often sit outside and drink coffee, and they don't seem to care much whether the dining environment is an enclosed and warm space). So, during this season, restaurants will light a bonfire in the evening for diners to keep warm, and everyone will sit at the table fully equipped to enjoy food that is not even delicious. There are usually bands performing to add to the fun. These bands seem to perform in one restaurant after another, and after each performance they expect guests to give some tips.
Look at the mess of the above meals, they are expensive and tasteless. It was okay at noon, but the temperature dropped immediately after the sun set in the evening. It was difficult to find something warm to eat. In addition, cheese, which I hate, is added to most dishes. My Chinese stomach really struggled here. Of course, it is still difficult to go to other places. Only China is my paradise.The hotels in the town are simple and expensive. They are clean and tidy, have 24-hour hot water for bathing, and have separate bathrooms, which are already very advantageous conditions. Because it is located in a desert, water resources are scarce, and the electricity is probably unstable (so hot water is limited, and air conditioning is not available). I saw many people on booking complaining about no hot water or unstable water for bathing, and some complaining about power outages.It feels like the voltage here is unstable or the power supply is limited. There are no high-power electrical appliances in the room, such as air conditioners, electric water heaters, etc. The hot water for bathing in the hotel where I stayed was heated by liquefied gas. The water heater was connected not to electricity but to a liquefied gas tank. This thing has almost been eliminated in our country, but I didn’t expect that it still plays a fundamental role here. If it is a hotel with average conditions, it may use solar heating, but there will be problems such as unstable hot water or only cold water after someone else uses up the hot water.Because it is winter, the house also needs a heater, so the most bizarre machine in this trip is finally coming out. This machine that we studied for three days and finally figured out how to turn on on the last day, I actually forgot about it. Take a photo of it. This machine is about the size of a mini refrigerator, with a heating panel on the front, just like the fire on the stove at home, except that the fire is placed on a vertical surface, and a liquefied gas tank is connected behind it. Then there is a hair dryer on the top, but this hair dryer consumes electricity instead of liquefied gas. When we saw that liquefied gas tank, we immediately became nervous. It wouldn't be poisoned or explode, right? The waiter saw that we were worried and kept comforting us. They all use this here and this machine is very safe. But later we found that we were a little too worried. Every time we heated it for twenty minutes, the fire would go out automatically, and it would never reach the stage of poisoning if we forget to turn it off. We have never figured out why the fire goes out, but because we are worried about any gas leakage, we always run over and manually close the liquefied gas valve after it goes out. Come to think of it, our country is already developing smart homes. In this remote South American desert, I am still studying this machine that can be turned on by luck and turned off based on my mood. However, it was not until the last day that a waiter finally told us the truth about the fire.What's even weirder about this machine is that it often fails to turn on. We strictly follow the step one, two and three instructions the waiter told us, but most of the time it fails. Every day I have to go to the front desk and ask the waiter to tell me that the heating machine cannot be turned on. Then the waiter comes over and tries to turn it on. Then I tried it on the spot and said, "Hey, it actually works." After a while, it went off on its own. When I tried, I couldn't open it again, so I went to find the waiter. Because I went to the waiter so often, let alone the waiter suspecting that I was an idiot, I even wondered if there was something wrong with me. Even after learning so many times, I still couldn’t do it.It wasn’t until the last day that we figured out the reason why it couldn’t be turned on: oxygen. When the waiter failed to turn on the machine according to the same steps as us, he actually opened the door, and then blew air on the heating panel of the machine toward the door. After blowing the air, the machine could be turned on normally. He explained that the automatic shutdown was because there was no oxygen. I understood that blowing the air at the door was also to replenish oxygen. I didn’t figure out where the oxygen was missing, but then I followed the same method and I could finally turn it on as I wanted. But It's time to leave. (I later guessed why every time I asked the waiter to come over, she could open it as soon as I tried. It should be that I put oxygen in every time I went out and came in, so they could open it every time when they came. It was really So weird)In addition, I have to lament how comfortable and convenient modern urban life is despite being the same. Although life in such a place with harsh conditions can satisfy human beings' temporary curiosity and willingness to endure temporarily for the sake of beautiful scenery, if You have a choice, I'm afraid no one wants to live in such an inconvenient environment for a long time.A very comfortable rest area in the hotel. Sitting here at noon is as warm as summer, but at night it becomes cold and wintery.
