It’s extremely dry and boasts a very Mars-like appearance, with miles and miles of nothingness surrounded by sparsely-populated mountains. Why go here, then? Star gazing, what else?! Since the Atacama receives very few cloudy days and little interference from pesky city lights, and is high above sea-level, it’s a star-gazer’s paradise. To get an even more extraordinary view of the southern hemisphere sky (the Fornax Cluster and Tarantula Nebula, among other galactic wonders, are oft seen here) from the Desert, there’s the world famous Very Large Telescope (at Paranal Observatory) and the soon-to-be Atacama Large Millimeter Array, the world’s largest radio telescope. @VIP_Nerd