The White Volcano

October 15, 2024, from the itinerary:

At 8am meet at the lobby to meet for your adjusted White Volcano experience.

We will drive 40 miles, approximately 2 hours and up 7200 feet to an altitude of 13,380 feet to the Geyser el Tatio.

This geyser field is owned jointly by the Toconce and Kaspana Indiginous Communities. The waters of the geysers reach 185 degrees as they come out of the steam vents (fumaroles). Some can reach heights of up to 10M (I’ve not seen that either time I’ve visited this field). Recently a few people died when they got too close, so the benches were removed.

After visiting the geyser field we will skip the drive up the hill and walk down to the river and another geyser field. After a stop for a quick drink, we will continue along the river to the White Volcano for lunch.

We continue down the river along the wetland and see llama, vicuña, and viscacha.

Weather: Sunny and hot ~80

Actual stats: 3.27 miles, elevation increase 309 feet to 14,113 feet (or there abouts).

The drive followed the same roads as yesterday, but continued up another 30 minutes to a second wetland. This second, higher wetland was larger and had mostly geese and coots. That said there were many Vicuña wading through on our return trip.

Just past this is a deserted mining camp. I don’t remember the detail, but they left everything which is now mostly covered by sand.

As we got out to look at the geyser field Adrien informed us the driver (!) had forgotten our hiking poles. What Adrian didn’t know is that my Spanish is good enough to tell they forgot something when we were only about 20 minutes out of town and they decided not to return for it - I didn’t hear what had been forgotten, but I know they realized it when it would have been possible to turn back for it.

I enjoyed the geyser field, but it was empty and a bit creepy.

After a walk around we continued to the trail head. It was clear neither Adrian nor the driver knew how to get us to our starting point. The road got very bad, so we told them to stop and we’d walk from there. We had to wait while Adrian changed into his boots (different ones from yesterday) and got his maté ready. It took him so long, we just started on our own.

We had a nice stop at the bottom of the road and waited for the geyser to pop, but gave up and continued. We had fond memories of stopping here last trip.

We had a nice walk down the valley following the stream

And saw an eagle and several viscachas

Until we got to the rock scrambling portion which is where it would have been REALLY NICE TO HAVE POLES.

We went by several yareta. This cushion plant grows only above 10500 feet and only 1 cm/year.

Anyway got through that and up to a small saddle directly across from the white volcano (another area where IT WOUD HAVE BEEN NICE TO HAVE POLES).

We found a nice flat area for lunch which was pumpkin soup and a vegetarian wrap. Adrian did bring the napkins this time, but no tea or desert.

This turned out to be a lovely place for lunch because there was a strong breeze to keep the bugs away and we were able to see the vicuña eat and drink in/near the river.

We could also see herds of them further down the valley.

After lunch we started the last section of our trek which we remembered most fondly from our last trip to Atacama.

We saw a lot of viscacha. We even saw one that allowed me within 3 feet before running away - I made it all the way to the rock in the photo on the right.

There were certainly a lot of bones littering the valley. It was clear this was a favorite hunting spot for some predator.

Adrian spotted a mouse running by (no photo, but well spotted)

As we got to the end of the hike we saw Maricio and the car. We were grateful that he pulled it down close to the valley floor so we didn’t have to walk up to it. We enjoyed a snack and a beer while watching llama, vicuña and birds.

We caught a baby nursing

These crested ducks had some young ones with them

We saw Perdiz- partridges - running along the road on our return.

Upon return to the hotel, we discussed the registration needed to cross into Bolivia for which you need the car plate number and to scan a QR code/fill out a form, etc. This task complete, we agreed to meet at 8am the next morning to begin the journey. Then we got another bit of information which was we were sharing a car to the border, after which we would have our own car again. Remember, we paid for private transport….more on that tomorrow.

It was very bizarre that the staff at Explora didn’t pro-actively tell any of their guests to do this Bolivian registration before leaving. We had to tell Natasha and Rob about it and they were already freaking out because they had no information about the border crossing. In return, they gave us the information that it would take about an hour with 3 checkpoints to cross the border - more on that tomorrow.

Dinner was quite nice, but yesterday’s was better.

Tonight I had a drink with whiskey in it (only 1 drink tonight). Dinner was potato soup and charcoaled eggplant. Desert was rose suspiro. I thought this would be rose meringue, but it turned out to be a pudding type consistency which tasted of roses.

Looking forward to our crossing into Bolivia tomorrow and to getting away from Explora Atacama.