Every once in a while we will get a submission that catches our eye. In this case, today we received a bunch of photos from a trip that Sebastian Venegas, Cristian Oñate, Cristobal Leyton, Enzo Villalon and Claudio Miranda Diaz took over in Chile recently. This one is interesting because Claudio kept a journal of the days events. Although it wasn’t the craziest trip ever, it looks like they had a great time and took in some sights and even caught a few good sessions along the way. Take a look!

Words & Photos by Claudio Miranda Diaz

“Thursday 20th, October 2016
In exactly one more week we start our journey to the city of Antofagasta, Chile. The reason? … thats the real question. Ahead are 7 days of travel, 5 riders and 1 department. Posibly like in all TRAVELS, the answer of that question is the search of that incredibe sensation called freedom, where we are pleased to feel a habitant of the earth, love to feel small before the planet and above all, save the best of every moment in our minds.

Day 1. Thursday
October 27th. 7:08 am. After sleeping only 1 hour, we woke up to realize that we where going to miss our flight, wich departted was at 8:15 am. Being the fastest we could, we made it to the airport at 7:36 am, but the flight was already closed like 7 mins before. After some arguing and paying a small fee we boarded the next flight at 10:30 am. After 1 hour and 50 min of flight we arrived at 12:20 hrs, in a desert with a very dry landscape. Antofagasta is located in the north of Chile. It is the 5th most populated city in our country and its development is in the base of the minery, so the city esthetically isn’t the prettiest place in our country, but its considered the capital of steet riding. At 13:40 hrs we where already settled in. Feeling very tired we spent the day chilling by the coastline of the city, resting and buying some food for the week.

Day 2. Friday
Today, already settled and rested we start the day full throttle. We woke up at 10:30 and spent some time chilling in the pool, then took a shower and made some lunch. We were out at 14:00 with our bikes in search of shoes for Oñate, then to a rent a car so the next day we could go to fulfill one of the goals in the trip. That goal was to take some shots of the milky way in the paranal observatory and the desert hand.
After that we made our way to the local skatepark, that is a very fun bowl. We spent all day in there and came back to the flat at 22 hrs, to eat and sleep, because tomorrow we have a very busy day.

Day 3. Saturday
6 am the alarm is already ringing. We woke up and then headed out to the Antofagasta main spot to watch the sunrise. Aprox at 9 am we head back to the flat and then to the paranal observatory at 130 km outside of Antofagasta at 2635 m above the sea. We arrive and we had to wait like 2 hours to get in. After a little tour of the facilities and the telescopes, we went out into the desert to take that photo I was waiting for… the Milky way. We were out there at 23 hrs enyoing the clear sky in the desert. After that we went home to eat something and sleep again. We drove 400 km that day.

Day 4: Sunday
We woke up very tired, and it’s already 14 hrs and we are just finishing eating, but today its going to be mainly BMX. First we went to the mall center to get some batteries, then to the coast. Today turned out to be very boring. We spent almost all the day in one spot. Later that day we went to a skatepark that had no bikes allowed, but we still managed to get some riding time in at this spot that was in the entrance of a mall. Tomorrow we hope to go to Antofagasta to ride the local skatepark.

Day 5 and 6: Monday and Tuesday
Today we were out at 12 pm to Calama, at 220 km aprox of Antofagasta. Here we thought about spending the night in a hostal, but changed our minds, bought a tent, and went to San Pedro of Atacama to spend the night there, in the Moon Valley.

After spending some time in a Little town, at 12 am we went to the highway to find a place to put the tent, then in the desert we made a fire, some burgers and then went to sleep.
At 4:30 am we woke up, and headed to the geysers at a place called Tatio, the bigest ones in the southern hemisphere and the 3rd in the world.
Aprox at 82 km of San Pedro of Atacama, at 4300 km above the sea level, we arrived at this spot to wait for dawn at 6:40 am.

At 12 pm we were back in San Pedro of Atacama and then heading to Calama to get out bikes that were in the house of a local rider (Luis Gutierrez). Finally we head back to Antofagasta.
1300 km in 4 days. Not all the riding we were expecting, but still we had a blast. Achieved trip?

Riders: Sebastian Venegas, Cristian Oñate, Cristobal Leyton, Enzo Villalon
Thanks: Sebastian Ruiz, Jorge Rojas” – Claudio Miranda Diaz