Atacama Desert

Currency budget Chile

San Pedro is expensive for Chile and many small operators want cash. Change money in Calama or Santiago rather than in the village, where the rates are poor and the queue is long.

ATMs & cards

There are two or three machines in San Pedro and they run out at the weekend and in high season. Draw what you need in Calama on the way in, and expect a fee on every withdrawal.

Draw what you need in Calama on the way in. San Pedro has almost no cash and several tour operators still want it.

Wherever you are: if the machine offers to charge you in your home currency, decline. That is dynamic currency conversion and the rate is set by the ATM's operator, not your bank.

Safety all of Chile

Crime is close to nil. The altitude is the whole risk: San Pedro is 2,400m, the geysers are 4,300m, and the Bolivian border crossings are higher. Arrive and do nothing for a day. The sun at this elevation burns in twenty minutes and the temperature falls 25°C after dark.

Our own assessment, not a sourced index.

Entry & visa Chile visa rules

Health & emergencies all of Chile

Required to enter

No vaccinations are required for entry from Europe or North America.

Orientation, not medical advice — entry rules change and what you need depends on your own history. Check with a travel clinic four to six weeks before you go.

Food tip

A small village with more restaurants than it needs and prices to match. The good ones do Andean rather than international: quinoa, llama, rica-rica in the pisco sour. Buy water in Calama, where it is a third of the price.

Nightlife

Two streets of restaurants with wood fires and pisco sours, and then everybody goes to bed because the tours leave at four.

• Caracoles Street — the one street, and everything on it
• Plaza de San Pedro de Atacama — the square, and the evening around it

Closing: 01:00, and the village is dark by then — there is almost no street lighting, by design.

A beer in a bar: CLP 4,000–7,000

Street lighting is kept low across the whole village to protect the observatories, which is why the sky here looks like that.

Getting around

• Transfer from Calama — 90 minutes, booked with your hotel or a shared van
• Bicycle — how San Pedro moves, and how to reach the nearer valleys
• Tour minibus — how almost everything else is reached, and priced per excursion
• Hire car — worth it for the geysers at your own hour, and the roads are good
• Airport: El Loa (CJC) at Calama, 100km away

Internet speedall of Chile

Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Chile, installed before you fly and working the moment you land.

Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026

Must-see

Nearby day trips

Say a few words

Spanish (Latin American)

• HelloHolaOH-la
• PleasePor favorpor fa-VOR
• Thank youGraciasGRA-syas
• Yes / NoSí / Nosee / no

The c and z are said as an s here, not the Spanish "th" — gracias is GRA-syas.

Religion

Catholic, and increasingly secular

Historically Catholic, with religiosity falling sharply among younger Chileans.

Do's and don'ts

Do

• Greet with one kiss on the right cheek between women, or a woman and a man; men shake hands
• Say buenos días on entering a shop and gracias on leaving, every time
• Accept the once — the late-afternoon tea and bread — if offered; refusing reads as cold
• In Patagonia, close every gate behind you; the estancias run sheep and the gates matter

Don't

• Do not assume Chilean Spanish will sound like the Spanish you learned — it is fast, clipped and full of local slang
• Do not bring up Pinochet casually; it divides families and is not small talk
• Do not eat anything with your hands at a table, including pizza and chips — Chileans use cutlery for almost everything
• Do not turn up on time to a private dinner invitation; fifteen to thirty minutes late is expected