Putre´s Puna and Altiplano

Trip Start Feb 25, 2009

Trip End Aug 12, 2009

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Flag of Chile Putre, Chile
Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Our last adventure in Chile took us to the high elevations of Putre and surroundings. The area was literally breathtaking. At 4500 m above sea level just walking down the street was a cardio workout. Putre is a tiny community of roughly 2000 people set high on the Andean slopes. The town shared the same chearful and friendly demeanour of every other Chilean town, only this time with alpaca steaks. Not quite as good as llama skewers, unfortunately.

From here we booked a 1-day tour up to Lauca National Park, set high in the altiplano. During the shoulder-season we managed to be the only 2 on the trip, along with our guide Franklin. He showed us ancient caves (currently occupied by a few nesting pairs of Andean Geese), and serenaded us to traditional Quechua music (a slightly awkward interaction, but interesting nonetheless). He later abandoned us to walk through the salt lakes and bofedal...an altiplano wetland habitat. Everything went fine until Angie fell up her thigh in a bog-hole. Stinnnnnky!

Unfortunately we couldn´t find one of the main avian highlights of the park (the rare and local Diademed Plover), but enjoyed the bounty of other birds and mammals and scenery in general; at least until the soroche (altitude sickness) kicked in. We then retreated down to Putre, and took it easy until our bus ride back to Arica the following day. Also in this park we ventured as far as the Bolivian border, as close as we´ll likely to come to that country this trip...it´ll just have to wait for next time.

Putre hotels Slideshow