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John Elkington

John Elkington

A world authority on corporate responsibility and sustainable development.

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Flamingos of the Atacama

John Elkington · 6 November 2014 · Leave a Comment

Signs of poverty - or perhaps of urban sculpture - in a nearby community
Signs of poverty – or perhaps of urban sculpture – in a nearby community
Uncomfortable - llama in a pen for tourists
Uncomfortable – llama in a pen for tourists
Three flamingoes, at different distances from my tiny camera
Three flamingoes, at different distances from my tiny camera
A shadowy selfie as I walk through the salt-beds
A shadowy selfie as I walk through the salt-beds
The Sun going down ...
The Sun going down …
... and a glorious Full Moon rising over the Andes.
… and a glorious Full Moon rising over the Andes.

This is an out-of-sequence blog entry, largely because when we went to the Los Flamencos National Reserve here in the Atacama Desert yesterday afternoon, in the middle of the great Salar de Atacama, I forgot my camera – and felt bereft for much of the trip.

Then I recalled that I had my BlackBerry, so took some pictures with that, through the quality is significantly lower. Am posting the images before doing the rest of the sequence on the Chile trip so that I can free up the minuscule memory on the phone.

We learned a good deal about the hydrogeology of the Atacama, adding to what we had been told by Paula in the morning when we visited the Valle de la Luna. What sticks in my mind particularly is the fact that the Atlantic and Pacific once met in this area, before the Latin american land mass began its inexorable rise, thanks to tectonic subduction.

The salt-flats of the Salar are wonderfully monotonous, though the landscape is broken by occasional bright green trees – and even a ‘forest’ planted some time back by the government.

In the distance , on the flanks of the Andes, we saw the base camp of the extraordinary ALMA project, with its 66 antenna observatory. In San Pedro last night, we discussed the planning controls here that minimise light pollution – something other countries and regions could learn from.

Apart from the flamingos, I saw a variety of birdlife, a number of what I imagine were Darwin’s leaf-eared mouse and a green and red lizard that I was told had only arrived in the area some 20 years ago.

The wind picked up markedly as the sun set – and then we went out behind the visitor centre to see the mountains pick up the reddish hues of the sunset. Some time after 20.00, a Full Moon popped its head over the Andes, and then rose majestically into the night sky.

The ride back was enlivened a woman who decided that her passport had been stolen from her bag while we were at the reserve. Silence settled. Fernando slept on the back seat. Then a vicious swerve as the driver steered around a wayward burro in the night. And then the missing papers were found in the woman’s bedroom.

After a late dinner, we sat out, around a blazing fire pit, and watched the Moon gradually ascend into the heavens – albeit drowning out many of the constellations it would have been good to see in more detail.

Wonderful conversation with a Swiss couple from Zurich, he apparently a very successful architect, she raised in the UK, and the family of four doing a 2-month trip around Latin America. Next, at least for them, is Easter Island. Given that I also learned yesterday that Easter Island is on the sub ducting plate, so will eventually collide with Chile, I said I would probably wait for the island to hove into view.

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Introduction

I began this blog with an entry reporting on a visit to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod, on 30 September 2003. The blog element of the website has gone through several iterations since, with much of the older material still available.

Like so many things in my life, blog entries blur the boundaries between the personal and the professional. As explained on this site’s Home Page, the website and the blog are part platform for ongoing projects, part autobiography, and part accountability mechanism.

In addition, my blogs have appeared on many sites such as: Chinadialogue, CSRWire, Fast Company, GreenBiz, Guardian Sustainable Business, and the Harvard Business Review.

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John Elkington is a world authority on corporate responsibility and sustainable development. He is currently Founding Partner and Executive Chairman of Volans, a future-focused business working at the intersection of the sustainability, entrepreneurship and innovation movements.

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john@johnelkington.com  |  +44 203 701 7550 | Twitter: @volansjohn

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