**5. Connectivity in Atacama desert: Routes and means of transport**

An important factor for such a distant landscape, at the end of the world, as geography texts indicated, was how to arrive there. Until the opening of Panama Canal, transport was provided via the Atlantic to the ports where ship companies arrived, mainly Valparaíso, and later Antofagasta or Iquique in the north.

Since the bay where piers were located—five of them at the end of the 1890s, one owned by The Pacific Steam Navigation Co. in 1910, and another one belonging to West Indian Oil in 1921—were shallow, boats and longboats (chalupas) were used for tendering passengers from the ships to the piers and vice versa. The construction of the fiscal port began in 1920. At the end of the decade, most of the carcass had been finished.

So, German, British, and Italian shipping lines stopped periodically, twice a month, in Antofagasta. The work done by longboats and freight boats was very important for this traffic until the fiscal port was finished. In 1919, these charged per passenger, either one-way or return tickets, or for a package, depending on size or weight [56].

As to railway connections, the network—Antofagasta–Bolivia Railway Co.—communicating Antofagasta with Potosi in Bolivia, went through Central canton. It left on Tuesday and Saturday and arrived on Thursday and Sunday. It stopped in Baquedano station, where it intersected the longitudinal railway belonging to the State Railway Company, created in 1919. This was the link between the central and southern provinces of Chile and Tarapaca in the north. Salinas station was the place for embarking and disembarking toward the pampa and Antofagasta. There were also connections to Aguas Blancas canton.

Roads were improved, coinciding with the introduction of mechanization in the nitrate mines and the expansion of copper production in Chuquicamata. Asphalt became a reality in the main road network of the territory [57].

The so-called "mass tourism" associated with seaside and seashore in Europe and the railway network in the USA in the period studied was not reviewed, as it was done in another source [58].

Concerning urban transport, ticket charges were based on the distance within urban perimeter, whether it was a work day or a holiday, and also according to the type of vehicle: 5-seat cars or 7-seat cars. They ran to Coloso port along the paved road and "speed was 20 km, children paid half the fees" [56].

In this way, the so-called attraction places in Antofagasta could be accessible for travelers and tourists: La Chimba, Coloso, and Auto Club, which were quite far from downtown, and the different recreation orchards and rides to the seaside or the seashore.
