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PARACHI 2003 EXPEDITION
About the expedition
During the period of August 31 till September 26 we had arranged
an expedition to Paraguay, Argentina and Chile.
At the beginning we participated in the conference held at the
Universidad Nacional de Asuncion, Paraguay. Then
we visited the biggest falls on the Earth - Iguazu
Falls, located on the border of Argentina and
Brazil. From the majestic waterfalls we moved to the La
Quinta ranch in Paraguay. Afterwards we continued to the
Grand Chaco plain, not fully
investigated flat, alluvial plain,
which is three times bigger than the
Czech Republic, but only sparsely settled by
small numbers of Indian collonies.
After the Chaco visit we had passed to
the Argentine Salta, and spent several days
with the outings to the Andes' mountains. Originally we
intended to cross the Andes to Chile by train (Tren de
las Nubes - Train to the Clouds). But nowadays the train
serves as a tourist attraction and does not cross the
border. Therefore we passed the Andes by bus in the
altitude of 5 000 meters to the Chilean Antofagasta,
where the ESO (European Southern Observatory) office
resides. The most interesting part of the expedition was
the VLT (Very Large Telescope) visit. VLT is the biggest
telescope in the world, located 120 km southwards from
Antofagasta, in the Atacama desert, 2 600 meters above
the sea level. The telescope consists from four 8.2
meter telescopes which in near future will work in
combined interferometer regime. The last part of our way
followed the Chilean coast to Santiago, from where we had
a flight to the Europe.
As a whole we traveled 6 400 kilometers over the
South America continent, took 1 800 photos and recorded
several hours of video clips.
Participants
Itinerary
Asuncion (Paraguay) - Itaipu (dam) - Iguazu
(waterfalls) - Grand Chaco - Salta (Argentina) - Andes - Antofagasta (Chile) - VLT - Chaņaral - Vallenar -
Santiago
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