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Published: November 2nd 2009
Salt Hotel
Seats, table, floor, walls - all are made of salt.Hello my loves,
Well last time I wrote we were in Peru I believe, since then we have done Bolivia and moved on to Chile!!! Of course it is no longer called Bolivia but The Pluricultural Republic of Bolivia - don't it just trip off the tongue? - whoever came up with it really should consider a career in advertising!
Although we went to La Paz, we didn't get to see any of it. We were exhausted having travelled all day and had to be up at 5.30 to set off to Oruro. We did this part of the trip by public bus which was fine. They put on a video of Gladiator (seen it) but it was quite fun to see it again in Spanish - though they didn't put it on till a third of the way through the journey so we didn't see the end - no-one seemed much bothered!
At Oruro we were met by our driver Moises and guide Juan Carlos. We spent the next three days in their company and they were delightful, softly spoken but funny and well . . . just great! We were travelling in a 4 x 4
Salt Hotel
One of the corridors of salt - looked so much like snow. which is just as well as there wasn't a patch of tarmac or asphalt anywhere! The road varied from sand to grit, to rubble - it was mainly rubble! We bumped along for a few hours with adobe huts and a few llamas on the horizon and stopped in a village for an ice cream - exorbitantly priced at 10p. We liked the ice cream sooooo much we decided to have a fruit ice lolly each too. After I remembered that we are not supposed to have water or ice from tap water - oops - a 5p lolly (cheaper than the ice creams) is almost certainly made with tap water!!!! But fortune smiled on us and our stomachs and bowels held out - hurrah!
En route we chatted and learned a lot about Bolivia - sorry The Pluricultural blah blah blah. With 60% indigineous population it has the highest indigineous population of any Latin country. The president Evo Morales is himself indigineous and as a socialist has forged strong links with Cuba and Venezuela. It is a very poor country and unlike its neighbours which have all known huge population growth in the last ten years, T P
Salt Flats
Allie in the middle of the salt flats. R of Bol hasn't grown at all. Many villages don't have electricity, and there is still community justice in many of them where key people in the community dispense justice which can include capital punishment!
After several hours we arrived at our destination the "Salar" or salt flats, and our salt hotel! Built of salt, with salt tables, chairs, and beds, and with about 15cm of salt on the ground throughout you crunch your way around the place! It is frankly wierd but wonderful. Out of the window there is what apears to be an endless sea of white. But it's not just salt, it contains lithium and T P R of Bol has the largest deposits of this much in demand material in the world! It also has more borax than anyone else so it has the potential to be rich one day. . . .
We loved the salt hotel, and the great foot exfoliation when you got up in the night to go to the loo. . . .
The next day we drove across the salt flat which was just incredible. Coz it's so flat you can get up quite a speed and
The support team for Allie
Ian , Juan Carlos and Moises and the intrepid Toyota Landcruiser in the middle of nowhere. it seems to go on forever.
They are currently building a road from Oruro to Chile which in theory will take another 12 months. This will change the whole experience of this trip in T P R of Bol - it will be much more comfortable but somehow it will lose something and I'm glad we've done it now - the uncomfortable way!
Scenery in T P R of Bol was very dramatic - mini grand canyon, incredible rock formations, and thermal springs with geysers blasting out steam, and mud bubbling in natural rock cauldrons. Standing there it felt like the earth was alive and could explode at any moment which of course it could as it is a volcano!
The second hotel we stayed in was very basic but really friendly and still clean etc etc. We really liked it although by this point I'm starting to get a bit fed up with chewy alpaca meat served with chips and rice. The food is pretty dreadful - certainly the worst we've experienced so far.
But the good news is now we are in Chile where we can have a pizza and a decent bottle of
Cactus Island
One of the islands in the middle of the salt flats had thousands of cacti on it. wine - hurrah! Passing from T P R of Bol to Chile was odd - one minute you are driving over rubble then suddenly you are on a proper road with road markings et al. The Chilean guide who met us was very western and trendy but not nearly as lovely as M and JC who we waved to sadly as we drove off. Effectively we are leaving one of the poorest countries in Latin America for the second richest (after Brasil).
Next day:
Loved the pizza and wine so much that I wolfed them down and had indegestion all last night!!! ¡Que tonta!
Heading back to the UK a week tomorrow . . . . ooh how excited you must all be getting ha!ha!
Big love
Allison
PS. Thanks Satty for the vote of confidnce in my writing - I promise I'll dedicate my first book to you. . . .
PPS. Thanks for the update on Strictly, Trevor, hopefuly we'll come back when the dross has gone and the competition is hotting up. Glad you enjoyed yor hols.
PPPS. Hola Balbi - esperando con ilusion verte pronto en Londres .
Flamingos
Thousands of flamingos were in this lake which itself is pink. . . me puedes traer el sugundo libro de Steig Larsson, he leido "los hombres que no amaban a las mujeres" en español y me encanto asi pienso seguir en español.
PPPPS. The Steig Larsson book I read is in fact called "the Girl with the Dagon Tattoo" in English and I loved loved loved it . . . . . for what it's worth.
¡Besos!
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Neil
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Condiments to the chef
Great account and wonderful photos - the salt hotel sounds fascinating and I hope that they had pepper on the table during supper. Broiled alpaca can be a bit too, err, salty for my taste. There's always the danger of under-cooking it as well. You can tell, as it rears up off the plate, picks you up and carries you to the nearest tin mine. I think the salt playa you were on is the largest in the world - left from an ancient lake that dried in the ice age. The lakes are full of minerals and crustaceans, which give the flamingos their colour. While you've been away enjoying things we've all had swine 'flu'. It'll be peak season when you get back!