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Published: December 3rd 2007
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Jamie: The landscape of southwest Bolivia couldn't look weirder or more wonderful if it had been designed by Salvador Dali. Indeed, one of the deserts is named after him. The amazing scenery, the strange rock formations and colourful lakes made our jeep tour through this area one of the highlights of our entire trip. No trip around South America would be complete without exploring this remote corner of Bolivia.
First, a note about the tours. We had heard so many horror stories about the 'jeep' tours (they're actually Toyotas), such as constant breakdowns, impatient or even drunk drivers, cramped conditions in the jeeps and rubbish food, that we decided to spend a day in Uyuni carefully selecting the company to go with. Of use would have been "Rankings", an organisation that listed the best companies to go with, but the worst companies managed to get them shut down. They still run a cafe-bar, and we were able to speak with the guy who used to run it, and he gave us some good advice. We eventually settled for the company "Blue Line Service", who used to be listed by rankings, and allowed us to meet the guide and inspect the
jeep beforehand (yes Geoff, we even looked at the tyres). We picked well. The jeep didn't break down once, our guide, Grover, was fantastic, there was plenty of room in the jeep as we weren't carrying a cook, and the food was pretty good. We could even plug our iPod into the tape player so we could listen to our music as we went. Grover had his own mp3 player, so for a while, we listened all his favourite 80s and dance hits. Our fellow passengers were great company - two girls from Denmark, travelling before beginning university, and another couple, she from Sweden, he from Switzerland.
Our tour began promptly with a visit to the train cemetary just outside Uyuni. Here sit the mainly British-built locomotives that used to haul precious minerals across the Andes to other countries, and return with crops from the lower countries. We were given a few minutes to take pictures and , like children, climb over these rusting relics. From here, we were taken to Cochani on the edge of the Salar de Uyuni. These salt flats were once part of a larger lake, which in prehistoric times dried up leaving patches of
hard salt crusts including the Salar de Uyuni, the largest in the world. The salt here is collected, dried and bagged for sale and export as table salt in the town of Cochani. We were shown how this is done and where they collect the salt from. From here we headed out onto the salar. We came first to the "salt hotel", which is now closed due to environmental concerns and remains a museum. The structure's walls and furniture is made entirely of salt.
Then we headed to Isla del Pescado,an island in the middle of the salt flat so named because it is shaped like a fish. We had a chance to explore the island before lunch. For a start, it is weird to see an island where there isn't any water. Secondly, it is covered in cacti that grow to as much as 10m in height. Truly spectacular. After lunch, our chance to take part in the popular activity of trying to play with the lack of perspective that exists on the salt flats by taking wacky photos. It wasn't easy with simple compact cameras, but have a look at our best attempts. Then we headed to
the south shore, stopping once more in the middle to appreciate the strange hexagonal patterns formed on the surface of the lake. On the south shore is another salt hotel (away from the salt flats) where we spent our first night. Again, everything is constructed with salt blocks.
Jenny: We spent both nights playing "shit head" (a great card game) with our new friends, with the winners taking it in turns to add ever more crazy rules to the game. Alas we had to retire relatively early to our salty beds in preparartion for the next days adventures.
We were up at 6am to see sunrise, it was advertised as being over the salt flats, but really it was mudflats in front of the salt flats. After an eggy breakfast we were on our way, first stopping in the village of San Juan, where Grover bought a beer (still only 7.30 am), pouring half the can over the jeep´s tyres in aid of "Pachamama" (Mother Earth) and drinking the other half. Then we drove on, past views of magnificent volcanoes, reaching the first of a series of lagunes for lunch. Here we saw 3 different varieties of flamingos.
They truly are amazing birds and we were able to get quite close (and hopefully got some good photos). Throughout the afternoon, we drove past a series of these lagunes, and the Arbol de Piedra (tree of rock), finally getting to Lago Colorada which is actually a National Park. This was a huge lake, with hundreds of flamingos. The lake was coloured red due to the micro-organisms in it. It was a breath-taking sight, and is now up there with the Iguazu Falls on my list of favourite things from our trip.
We also stopped on route at some rocks to meet some of the local rodent population (viscachas). These little creatures were a cross between rabbits and wallabies, and really quite tame. We also saw lots of vicuñas (a relative of llamas and alpacas), who apparently are very organised and always poo in a special toilet circle (I thought they were campfire patches).
Night two was spent in a fairly basic hostel, but our tour company gave us a bottle of red wine which was a nice surprise. More cards, then another early night before an even earlier start (4am). On our third day we set off
v early to see the geysers as they are most active first thing in the morning. We were not to be dissappointed and were the first to reach the bubblling muddy gesyers which occassionally through out splashes of boiling mud. The whole area smelt of sulphur (as did our clothes till we got them washed here in Salta). We later found out that some guides warned their tourists about getting too close, but ours led us up close, only telling us as we were driving away that one set of geysers were only 3 years old and that new ones could errupt at any time. There was one artificial one that they use to generate electricity.
After the geysers we went to sleep for a (bumpy) hour or so until we got to the hot springs. Again they stank of sulphur but we were not to be deterred. We took off all our layers and wooly hats (it was absolutely freezing) and jumped into the 33 degree water. It hurt at first, but soon our feet had thawed and it was great. Afterwards we had breakfast prepared by our guide, and were then on our way to the border,
passing the Salvador Dali rocks, and the naturally toxic laguna verde. At the border, we said goodbye to the group and headed (after hanging around for ages) to San Pedro in Chile. The border officials were the most friendly we´ve encountered so far, and when the saw the name on my passport they called me "J-Lo!"
Jamie: Though there is lots to see here, we spent only one night in San Pedro de Atacama. We tried to go on a star-gazing tour (perfect in the desert), but it was cancelled due to cloud. In the desert! We had originally planned to head to the coast from here and travel south to Santiago through Chi, but we'd been told the Argentinian side of the Andes was better, and because we liked Argentina the first time, we changed our plans. The buses to Salta (Argentina) only go three times a week, so we got on the next one, meaning just one night in San Pedro. The bus took all day, with lots of waiting around, first to get out of Chile, and then to get into Argentina. It was quite late when we got to Salta, so we went with the
first hostel tout to approach us (a startegy that, so far, has not failed to pay off for us). The hostel is nice, and today, we spent a fairly relaxed day in Salta. Tomorrow, we go on a tour, and the next day plan to head to Mendoza (18 hour bus journey!) where wine tasting is the thing.
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Elaine Whitehead
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amazing
What an amazing place! You really are having quite an experience. Looking forward to seeing you soon and hearing more about it all.