The earth shook and the moon shone.

Just east of La Serena is a very pleasant town of Vicuña. It was here that we experienced our first noticeable earth tremmor in Chile, whilst taking a nap in the tent, I felt the earth move (And no, Mike wasn't in there with me). Our purpose for stopping in for a night was to take in the public observatory called Mamalluka. It was truely amazing. From 10pm until 1am, yes I know, it was way past my bed time, we were treated to a very passionate presentation of the stars in the southern hemisphere. This included looking through telescopes at the moon, the Southern Cross and all manner of cosmos things. It was late and I was tired so I don't remember the terminology for most of the stuff our guide shared with us but we did get to see the rings around Saturn and a take a very cool photo of the moon. Plus we learnt how to find north by looking at the Southern Cross, and that there are 13 star signs not 12 and Pluto is no longer a planet. Needless to say I didn't wake too early the next morning. All that education was hard work.