Antofagasta, or the North Pearl, is a port city north of the Chilean capital, Santiago. Its eastern edge is bounded by the steep hills of Chile’s Cordillera de la Costa; the Pacific Ocean is to its west.

Twelve miles of coastline and a mild climate with an average temperature of 17°C have helped this city develop as a year-round beach resort. It has cloudless skies throughout the year, due to which there are numerous observatories with some of the world’s largest telescopes.

Antofagasta’s lucrative nineteenth-century nitrate mines attracted many foreign settlers, and the architecture and atmosphere of the city has a typical European influence. Its population of over 3,00,000 is primarily Chilean, but there are Croatian and Greek communities as well. Fishing and mining are the dominant activities.

On the northernmost tip of Chile lies the oasis of Arica, a coastal town not far from the Peruvian border. It sits on the edge of the Atacama Desert.

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