I decided to leave San Pedro de Atacama very early, to minimize as much as possible my time in the sun. Great idea... nice try, Simon. Couldn´t even sleep very well that night, and left San Pedro at 05:30 AM. It was still dark, and the full moon was shining beautifully and magically on the weird and barren landscape. Near San Pedro there is a valley, The Valley of the Moon. The reason for the name is that it apparently looks like the moon landscape. I personally haven´t been to the moon, but can tell you that pretty much most of the Atacama desert looks like the moon - flat sand, and hills, and rocks in various formations. And really nothing else. When I actually looked at it, in between the cycling struggles, it was beautiful.

Part 1 was the first 40 km of the whole distance of about 103 km, between San Pedro and Calama. And it was pretty much all climb, with one downhill in between, where I clocked my record speed on this bike - 68 km/hour. Bikes do go fast downhill once heavily loaded. The rest of it was climbing to an elevation of about 3200 meters, and it took a long time. Really long - heavy bike, thin air, steep hills. I eventually made it to the top at 12:00 in the afternoon. Yes, 6.5 hours for about 40 km, with lots of stops. This must be my record slow! At first, I was really confused how come I have to stop and catch my breath every so often (very often). Somewhere along the road, I finally clued in - this is called altitude sickness... duhhh...

Part 2 was a blast, quite literally. The other side of the summit was a nice and gentle rolling decline, and even the slight headwind didn´t prevent me from flying at an average speed of 35 km/hour, and more. And I thought to myself, "Simon, you will be in Calama in no time, if this continues." However, that lasted for about 30 km, and then the Gods of the desert showed up. They are called the (in)famous Chilean winds. Which brought me to...

Part 3, where I struggled with the wind, in my face, which was strong, hot and dry, and nonstop. Took me about 5 hours to cover the last 35 km, including walking here and there for a bit. Eventually, I rolled into Calama at 5:00 PM, being on the road for 11.5 hours. And finished all the water I took with me, which was 5 bottles of 1.6 liters each, and another one of apple juice.

Chilean drivers are very friendly, honking and smiling and waving. Hey, I can understand - I would be smiling too, if I was driving and looking at some crazy person on a weird-looking bike, in the middle of literally nowhere.

While in Calama, I decided to drop some weight (as some of you have suggested), and sent two packages of stuff home. Basically, I am now traveling with just a Swiss army knife and a piano wire; failing to have the latter, I am using a harmonica instead. I mean, really - does a person needs more than two pairs of socks for 7 weeks? ;-)