Chile is a country of unmatched beauty and ecological diversity. This sliver of a South American country is home to tundra, tropical rainforests, the Andes mountains, beaches, and the Atacama Desert — a virtually rainless plateau made up of salt basins and lava flows.

Although there are portions of the desert which haven’t seen a drop of rain since recordkeeping began, more than a million people occupy the 600 mile (1000 kilometers) parched stretch of land. The desert ascends upward into a plateau from Chile’s thin coastal shelf and at its center boasts, what scientists call absolute desert, Earth’s driest place. Nothing lives there, nothing rots, and everything is preserved by the extreme lack of moisture.

The Atacama is home to resilient farmers utilizing drip-irrigation systems (olives, cucumbers, and tomatoes), coastal fishers, llama and alpaca herders, and a wide range of scientists (astronomers relish the clear skies of Chile).

Empty river beds stretch across the barren expanse of the desert, many of which scientists believe have been dry for more than 100,000 years. The mountains, some nearing 30,000 feet in elevation, are completely glacier free. The Andes are a young range and much of their height can be attributed to a lack of erosion.

Some sectors of the desert benefit from what the locals call Camanchaca, a marine fog responsible for sufficiently hydrating hypolithic algae, lichens and even cacti. Due to the expansive desert’s surreal appearance, it’s scenery has been used in films to portray Mars (most notably in the television series Space Odyssey: Voyage to the Planets) and scientists from NASA have even began harnessing the Atacama Desert’s unique terrain for testing equipment which may be used in future Mars missions.

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