Easter Island, one of the most mysterious and remote places in the world, is being coupled with Chile's starkly beautiful Atacama Desert on a tour designed by LanChile Vacations.
The trip, which can be arranged for one or two weeks, begins with a visit to Easter Island, a 64-square-mile triangle of volcanic rock in the South Pacific.
The island is more than 2,000 miles from the nearest population center and is best known for the giant 1,000-year-old stone monoliths on its coastline. It has been called an open-air museum because of its many archeological sites and because of the baffling history of its first inhabitants.
Easter Island's clear blue waters sharply contrast with the Atacama Desert, the second stop on the itinerary.
The Atacama is the driest area in the world, with regions where rainfall has never been recorded. Despite this, its landscape is striking: a vast region of intense colors, peaks and expanses of desert.
The LanChile tour books travelers into Explora, a luxury hotel that offers various excursions in the area.
Cost: A weeklong tour starts at $3,000, including air fare from LAX, airport transfers, bilingual guided tours, three nights in a hotel on Easter Island, breakfasts on Easter Island, sightseeing and national park entrance fees. In the Atacama, the tour includes three nights' accommodations, all meals and a choice of excursions by trekking, horseback riding, mountain biking or van to visit salt lakes, geysers, the Valley of the Moon and ancient villages.
Contact: LanChile Vacations; (877) 219-0345, www.lanchilevacations.com.
Sierra: Photo Tour
Catch one of California's premier fall color shows Oct. 20 on a four-day photo safari along the eastern flank of the Sierra Nevada, where groves of aspens turn golden as winter approaches.
The mini tour, co-sponsored by the San Diego Natural History Museum and Image Quest Photography Tours, will visit Lundy Canyon and Monitor Pass in the Sierra. The group will stop at the ghost town of Bodie, an 1880s boomtown that is now a state historic park, and Mono Lake, known for its eerie pillars of limestone. Salty Mono Lake provides the nesting habitat for a large population of migratory gulls and grebes.
Photographer Mark Forbes will accompany the tour.
Cost: $320 per person, double occupancy, including guided photo and natural history walks, picnic lunches and a three-night stay at the Bridgeport Inn. Transportation is not included; participants meet at the Bridgeport Inn and caravan to the sites.
