We had been traveling the Atacama desert for a couple of days and heading east towards a remote pass into Argentina. As the road began up a long slow incline we were set on edge by a number of burnt out car bodies. One front left wheel had been driven to destruction (not just the tyre, the wheel). We wondered if these were stolen cars used in drug running. We continued. The mountains started and then snow in the desert. Fortunately a big machine had cleared the snow and we continued - until we got to the point where the big machine had given up. We backtracked a little and climbed a little side track to an airy knoll at 3620m altitude, with 360° views. The altitude sickness set in later that evening. map
