Pultizer prize-winning critic (his topic just happens to be automobiles) Dan Neil reports on his car trip in Chile. He begins:
I’ve got a thousand miles behind me and three thousand to go. I’ve got a dashboard tan. Hammer down. Radar love.
It’s the middle of the night in the middle of the Atacama Desert, along a stretch of haunted ground called the Pampa del Indio Muerto. I don’t speak Spanish but I get the idea. This is the land that rain forgot.
Guidebooks call this part of northern Chile “lunar” or “Martian,” and during the day it’s understandable because the cracked lifelessness stretches to the ashy horizon. Water seems like folklore. But at night, well, night is different. Northern Chile has dark and transparent air — silver-lidded observatories eye the heavens from nearby mountaintops — and the sky is whitewashed with stars. You will never feel more Earthbound. Here you can appreciate your significance in the universe, and the news is not good.
Key quote: “But the fact is, most of the world isn’t paved, and that’s the part I long to see.”
I’d like to quote more, but go read Neil’s report — and don’t miss the photos.