Days in the Desert

South America » Bolivia » Potosí Department » Uyuni
October 14th 2006

Published: October 23rd 2006

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Trace from NZ

The little guy

Trick photography out on the salt flats

So after Salta it was of to Humahuaca for a couple of days, and then into La Quiaca where we met up with some fellow travelers to walk across the Bolivian border. They were to become our traveling partners for the next week and just so happened to be a Kiwi, Craig, an Aussie, Pedro (actually Pete), and a Zimbabwean, Kim. The border formalities were surprisingly easy, and within half an hour we were walking through the cheap markets of Villazon, Bolivia. And I mean absurdly, ridiculously, unbelievable cheap! After arranging lodgings and onward tickets, we decided to go in search of some food. Since we’d been warned against dodgy Bolivian food, we decided to stay away from the market stall food, and amazingly the only suitable food we could find was fried chicken and chips.

Anyway, as luck would have it we managed to arrive in town during a festival that seemed to revolve around a parade featuring dancing children and band music. It was actually really neat to see.

An eight hour train ride later, and we had arrived in Uyuni at 11.00pm. Thankfully we had no problems finding a hostel for the night, so it was

View from up top

The statue that looksdown onthe town center of Humahuaca, north-west Argentina

straight to bed. Lucky for us, our Gold Coast friends had managed to drag themselves out of bed and arranged a four day tour of the salt flats, Salar de Uyuni, before we had even woken. So at midday off we went on a four day mission that was to cover the vast distances of south-west Bolivia.

The first day was absolutely amazing, with the blindingly white salt flats that seemed to stretch across the horizon forever and the views of grand volcanoes in the distance. We ended the first night at the base of a volcano that was literally in the middle of nowhere and was surrounded by flamingoes, llama, and apparently pumas. The hill side was also covered in ancient Inca fences, although we were never told what they were for.

The next day we woke with the prospect of climbing the massive volcano to an altitude of more then 4500meters. No easy feet. Well, with Andrews past experience at altitude, we decided we’d better take it easy. At the bottom of the volcano we were shown into a cave that housed the remains of Inca corpses who had died from the toxic fumes of the

Humahuaca

A typical street in Humahuaca housing our hostel that was run by a lovely old woman

volcano hundreds of years ago. After the cave we were left to our own devises to find our way up to the highest lookout on the volcano. Unfortunately our group was not at its strongest with Kim being violently the night before, an Andrew having problems with his dodgy lung. The thin air was giving Andrew too much trouble, so he wisely decided to head back down, the rest of us eventually managing to make it all the way up. Altitude certainly makes exercise extremely difficult.

After lunch it was off to other sights and plenty more ground to cover. The rest of the trip was not quite as remarkable, as we all, with the exception of Pedro, started to feel the strain of so much driving through the altiplano on bumpy, unpaved roads, in the seemingly endless expanse of dry, dusty desert. Over the next three days we saw historic sights, numerous lagoons and flamingoes, lots of volcanoes, more slat, geysers and hot pools.

By the end of it we were glad to be able to give our legs a good stretch and be back on paved roads.

After the tour, we had our final meal