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Field Notebook
Field Notebook

Salar de Atacama
Spring, 2010
Salar de Atacama, Chile


(photo: cc)
(photo: cc)
Crossing the salar: an irregular surface of salt-rimed mudholes. It's like walking a railroad track, every step avoiding a gap. Dried mud gives way to enormous vistas of salcified salt. It is awful ground for walking, slabs breaking, cutting, shattering. Every step a different length, there is no rhythm. It is a jarring, disorienting landscape, nothing to measure any palpable distance. The salt surface creaks and crackles under the sun. My clothes are stiff, shoe laces squeak when I cinch them. I feel myself drying, my waterfat leaving me. I am becoming a different animal.

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