Our final stop in Bolivia was, a more or less compulsory, visit to the Salar de Uyuni and the surrounding area. This salt flat, which was once a giant lake, is the largest in the world and roughly the size of Lebanon. Admittedly Lebanon isn’t perhaps the most impressive country for size comparison purposes, but you get the picture, it’s big. As well as a tourist destination, the area is also, perhaps not surprisingly, prime mineral extraction territory. It is estimated that the area contains something like half of the world’s lithium. If, in years to come we’re all [View Full Entry]

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Before I started this trip, I was sure that I wanted to see Machu Picchu and do the Inca trail, but there is a 3 months in advance reservation required. After further investigations I decided to join a tour for 3 weeks, so that I was sure to do the Inca Trail and have some company for a while. Even though I must say it is very easy to travel around Southamerica alone, I always meet people heading the same direction. So there we go, a group of 7 meet in Lima to join this 3 weeks tour through Peru to [View Full Entry]

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Hi it is Omer In Uyuni we went to a desert called Salar. Actually it´s not a sesert it´s a desert made out of salt and only now starts the adventure! Day 1 - We went to visit a cemetery of trains. The trains that are there, are not in use any longer, because they were working on coal, and now the trains in Bolivia use gasoline. Then we went to the Salar. First of all, we went to mountains of salt. Then we went to a factory of s [View Full Entry]

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A 4.00 am start to the day, waking up within these walls of salt, I had to question where I was. Many times recently I lose track of where I am in my semi-conscious state. We’ve often been moving so quickly, it’s disorienting and at times quite disturbing to not know where you are, let alone what day it is. Your conscious mind kicks in though and corrects the anxiety, and today I remember that I’m on the edge of the Salar, sleeping with my friends, and ready for a new adventure. A swift breakfast and we’re on the road, or [View Full Entry]

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Hi it is Nitzan and I am going to write a long blog. From La Paz we drived 20 hours in a bus to a small town called Rurenabaque. There we found a hostel that was full of Israelis but we had no choice. The next morning we found an agency to go to the Pampas.The Pampas is a kind of a savanna.The next morning we woke up early and got on the way with our group to the Pampas. We drived in a jeep for three hours and on the way we saw lots of hawks, eagles, and even one [View Full Entry]

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Making our way up the rio Beni it felt like we were embarking upon a real adventure. The jungle you read about as a child, those tales of mysterious Africa, felt real as we headed up to our jungle lodge deep in the Amazon basin. This definitely felt different to our jungle trip in Peru. There was just something about it that made you feel like you were venturing into the unknown. This was the jungle that I had signed up for. A gruelling seven hour boat ride from Rurrenabaque and we arrived at the river bank ready for a half [View Full Entry]

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We're now in Peru. Thank god. They nearly didnt let me leave Bolivia...i'll get to that in a minute but first an update on our last few days in 'lovely' Bolivia (i only write that with muted sarcasm becasue Bolivia has really pissed me off in the last 24 hours, i love it really!!) So we ended up getting delayed in our Amazon oasis, Rurrenabaque for another day as we were rained in meaning no planes could fly. By the end of our week there we were getting a bit fidgety and as everyones stomachs had turned to sludge we were [View Full Entry]

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The surreality of La Paz is perhaps expressed no more distinctly than in the "Valley of the Moon", or "Valle de la Luna" as it is known here. Where in England, could you find a city, where moonscapes flank its edges? Quite normal here though, normal in this capital of Bolivia, a microcosm of the strangeness of its mother country. We visited the valley this morning, but I'm still not sure what to make of it. What can you make of it really? It just is. On the way back we saw the country's Presidente; Evo Morales, or so we thought. [View Full Entry]

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The next stop on our journey west through Bolivia, was Sajama National Park, home of the eponymous volcano, Bolivia’s highest peak. For some reason this beautiful area receives relatively few visitors and therefore has no public transport links. Or perhaps more likely, the lack of transport explains the lack of visitors. Either way, we’ll be surprised if this situation continues for much longer. To get there, we needed to board a La Paz bound bus from Santa Cruz and ask to be let off at the small town Patacamaya, from where we could charter a taxi for an hour or so [View Full Entry]

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The chicken bus to Potosi only cost me £2.80. I felt somewhat over charged considering the the death trap on wheels which I was about to board would be lucky if it make it to the end of the street never mind Potosi. When I got on the bus, a lady was sat in the seat which I had booked. Now, under normal circumstances I would have let her sit there without a problem, but the amount of times I have been asked to vacate a seat whilst in South America because it has been booked then it felt quite good [View Full Entry]

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