THE ATACAMA VIAJERO - IN RETROSPECT

PREFACE: THE BIRTH OF THE DREAM

[Note: So here at last begins my oft-promised retrospective on my multiple South American adventures. I'll begin by attempting to describe what got me into this wild sort of solo adventure travel, and then I'll go from there, back to the year 2002...]

When I was a boy I started dreaming about the farthest reaches of South America. As a matter of fact, I think that my curiosity about this land which stretched out below the equator began to form almost as soon as I came to realize that there was such a place. I have fond memories of a wonderful jigsaw puzzle our family had of North America which I enjoyed putting together over and over. It went from Alaska all the way down as far as Panama, and that beyond that small, semi-twisted appendage of land was the start of a whole other continent, beginning with a country labeled Colombia, but which sadly extended beyond the borders of the puzzle, so everything beyond the edge of the board was a big mystery. Sure, this is all fairly fanciful stuff for a little boy in nursery school, but I really do believe that North America jigsaw puzzle was the first thing to get me intrigued about South America.

Through the next dozen years of schooling I'd learn about the various countries down there, but I have to admit I found most of the materials we had to study to be pretty boring and ultimately forgettable. But when I was in the seventh grade, our social studies teacher gave us the opportunity to show a little creativity with one assignment, and I eagerly chose to make a salt-relief map of South America. Now I know that I have already posted the picture my dad took of me hard at work on that map, but I think it is worth posting here as well, so here it is.

Even though that modest little project was completed nearly fifty years ago I can state that I still have vivid memories of each step in the process of constructing a somewhat accurate three dimensional re-creation of the entire continent, and can still recall how fun it was. At last, here was a real hands-on experience with the otherwise turgid geography lesson, and I loved it. My recollection of whatever grade I had earned (it was an A) pales greatly next to the sheer pleasure I had experienced in creating my map.

Unfortunately, time and the elements would not be kind to this little personal masterpiece, and my South America map fell victim to a fatal case of mildew which attacked and destroyed it where my parents had stored it - down in our flood-prone basement. So now I am left only with the above little black and white photograph and with the memory.

Then the years passed. I grew up and left home to go off to college and eventually graduated with a bachelor's history degree. In time I got married, started a business, and had my two children. Any conception of a "dream" to go to South America didn't really seem to exist. At least not then.

But a little over twenty years ago the dream was born. That was the time when my marriage was irreconcilably crashing on the rocks. I knew I needed to get away from it all, even if for just a short time. No doubt the madness of the moment had effected my thinking when I made the fateful decision to load up my camping gear in my sturdy Toyota Landcruiser and go with my dog Molly as my only travel companion on a real adventure journey - to drive as far down Mexico's Baja California peninsula as I could. Before that trip, I'd ventured into Mexico a couple of times, once just to buy some tequila across the border, and once to camp out overnight on the beach at Puerto Peñasco (Rocky Point), but never anything like this. It was my first real penetration into a part of Latin America, and although I couldn't speak even a word of Spanish, I felt like I was discovering a whole new world. And as I drove farther down that incredibly long peninsula, I started to imagine what it would be like to go ALL the way down - all the way to Tierra Del Fuego!

The above three photographs were taken on that eventful three week journey down the Baja Peninsula. In the upper right, a self-portrait taken on the shores of Bahia de Los Angeles on January 16, 1990. Then the small shot on the left is the spectacular sunrise on the morning of January 17 at Bahia de Los Angeles. Finally, the larger picture shows my dog Molly and my Toyota Landcruiser at my camp in the boojums, not far from Cataviña.

Anyway, so that's where my South American dream was born, on that trip into Baja California in January, 1990. Even though I was alone, I felt that I'd had the time of my life on that journey and that prompted me to start learning Spanish. More Baja trips ensued, and and then one big drive far down the west coast of mainland Mexico, as far as San Blas and over to the city of Tepic to buy Huichol art works, camping where I could.

But the dream would take years to come to fruition. I remember in April 1996, while attending the annual Lubbock Arts Festival in Texas, there was a South American Andean folklore ensemble performing named Markahuasi whose music was absolutely infectuous. The band's charango player happened to be from Valdivia, Chile. I can recall having an extensive conversation with him about South America. I told him that I really wanted to go there, and he replied to me that if that was so, then I had really better make plans to go and not to let anything interfere with that dream or I just might not make it. I never forgot his message, but still it would take me another six and a half years to make my dream become a reality, when I finally made it at the end of November 2002.

And so next up on this recounting of my South American adventures will be part one of the story of that magnificent first trip of discovery. Stay tuned, my friends.