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After a tricky time in La Paz finding a bus out of the city to Uyuni (due to bus strikes), we set off on the long journey south. We arrive in Uyuni at 6am after a cold and uncomfortable bus ride. Needless to say it´s absolutely freezing when we get of the bus and set off in search of a warm room to catch up on some sleep. Finding that many places have no beds available we start panicking, our hands and feet turning to ice. So, at 7am we find ourselves banging on The Palace Hotel door until an old woman pops her head out the window and lets us in.
After a few hours sleep I wake up, my feet still feeling like blocks of ice and able to see my breath in the room. No heating then...
Uyuni is a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, but has nice strip of cafes and tour operators, all selling jeep trips out into the famous Salt Lakes. After some breakfast we book up a four day trip in a jeep, leaving us the rest of the day to wander around the market and relax.
The four
day trip....
DAY 1:
We set off at 11am in the jeep, containing the driver, a cook, three Israeli´s and us three in the back. Very cosy to say the least. Our first stop is the train graveyard, basically where disused trains are dumped. It makes for a very eerie spot, just the metal carcusses of trains lying in the middle of nowhere.
We then set off on a long drive over bumpy terrain until we stopped in a tiny desert village for lunch. Despite good intentions, the steak we had for lunch was horrendous, leading us to the only possible conclusion - it was dog. This may not be true, but it was the worst meat we´d ever tasted. The Israeli girl even gave the poor cook some tips on how to prepare our food...!
After lunch, we headed further into the desert until we reached ´The Valley of Rocks´. This was a large area full of the most surreally shaped rock formations I´ve ever seen. We wandered around in the sunshine, admiring the weird rocks as the sun began to drop. When we arrived at our overnight stop, it was starting to get cold
so we grabbed a football and played on the dusty pitch outside our lodgings. Within minutes we had nearly 10 Bolivian boys playing a game with us, the sun setting beautifully behind the hills. This was great fun, we played with the local boys until we could no longer see the ball, then retired for food and another cold nights sleep.
DAY 2:
The early start (6.30am) meant it was freezing as we got ready to leave. Our guide and cook seemed to be finding it as hard as us to wake up; we were an hour late leaving. The morning consisted of a long drive, made much easier by the tunes coming from the I-pod converter supplied by the company. What a Godsend that was, otherwise it was to be two traditional Bolivian music cassettes on loop...
Our first stop was the intruiging geysers. We wandered round the bubbling holes, trying to avoid getting sprayed by the constant spurts of clay. Matt got splashed from the biggest geyser, leaving a nice lump of hot clay on his sleeve. These geysers were some sight, dozens of craters conataining different coloured bubbling clay.
Another long drive followed,
taking us to our lunch stop - next to some lovely hot natural springs... We bathed in the warm water and the sunshine until lunch was served. Again horrible steaks but enough pasta to fill us up. We then set off for the lagoons...
These lagoons were first blue, then green and finally red. Stunning views of these vibrantly coloured lakes set against mountains are brilliant blue skies. Oh and llamas and flamingos aswell!
Day 3:
We spent the night in the middle of nowhere on in a tiny, rickety old place with concrete beds. It was suprisingly comfortable and warm, which only made it harder to wake up in the freezing cold morning.
Today consisted mainly of driving out towards the salt flats, stopping to take in flamingos and more stunning lagoons and the ´Stone Tree´ in the Dali Desert (see pic).
At the end of the day we made the long drive to the edge of the salt lakes, giving us an amazing sunset to enjoy whilst perching on our beds, this time made of salt. We spend the evening playing cards and drinking awful Bolivian wine.
Day 4:
We are
up even earlier to catch the sunrise over the salt flat. We clamber into the jeep and head towards the horizon, a pure white ocean infront of us. As we race along the salt, the sun begins to rise, casting huge shadows across the floor. Blues and reds suddenly surround us... words cannot describe it...
We head of to an island amid the salt for breakfast and the mandatory silly photos before visiting the salt hotel and cruising back to Uyuni sat on top of the jeep. Dangerous but fun...!
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