The Atacama looks the way it does because nothing softens it. The light is sharp, the air is thin, and the geology has not been weathered into approachability. Lagoons appear chemical-blue against pale flats. Volcanoes rise without foothills. Roads cross terrain that, photographed, would not be believed.

Chile asks travellers to make peace with distance.

The country runs more than four thousand kilometres from the Atacama in the north to the southern reaches of Patagonia, and the gap between its landscapes is not only geographic but tonal.