Out-of-the-World Villages of Atacama

Abstract

T IS no wonder that Toconce, Aiquina, and Caspana are called out-of-the-world villages.' The Antofagasta and Bolivia Railway lies over thirty miles to the west. The old transandean route through San Pedro de Atacama, once the main road from Bolivia and still important for the cattle trade from Argentina, runs some two-score miles to the south. The three villages lie tucked away in their respective canyons as peaceful and as undisturbed as they must have lain for centuries and as they are likely to remain for centuries to come. Although an occasional automobile does arrive at Aiquina to create a stir of wonder among the natives, the only possible ways of reaching the other two villages are on foot or in the saddle. Their location as well as their poverty makes the cost of building even a cart road prohibitive. The two automobile roads which run into the general vicinity of the three villages are unused, and one of them fell into a complete state of impassability during the heavy rains of February, I9252. This is the truck road of Punta Blanca that was built and operated by the Chile Exploration Company some ten years ago, when the pipe line was laid from the source of the Toconce River to Chuquicamata. The other road runs from San Pedro inland (on the Antofagasta-Bolivia Railway), following the San Pedro and Inacaliri Rivers and swinging south around Toconce mountain to the geysers at Tatio. It was used by Italian engineers when they conducted experiments at the latter veritable Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes with a view to building a natural-steam power plant similar to the one at Larderello in Tuscany, but their project lies dormant pending the receipt of necessary funds. Even the great scenic beauty of that section of the higher Andes remains happily unexploited. The few privileged visitors lose their hearts on first beholding it: the Vega of Turi, bunch grass and hummocks and sand at the foot of the snow mountains, for all the world like a transplanted bit of Iceland; the bordering range on the south, barren and weird, like a lunar landscape; the Toconce valley with all the riotous colors and grotesque formations of the Grand Canyon; and something of Colorado about the cordillera trails, bunch grass, sagebrush, and rock strata standing on edge.