Potosi

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Russ and I left tupiza for the Salar de Uyuni, the bus ride was 6 hours and we didnt see a single house for the first four. all of south western/central Bolivia is part of the rugged altiplano which is extremely dry extremely and extremely high. it rains for 3 months of the year, from now until febuary, and the rest of the year it is completely dry. there are absolutely no paved roads outside cities, the ride to Uyni was a single lane bumpyass dirt road that wound up and down through the most picturesc mountains I have ever seen. Salar means salt flat which is a natural phenominon that is seen in many places throughout this part of the andies though the salt flat outside Uyuni is by far the largest in the world. Salt flats are huge expanses of salt, 4 meters thick left over from ancient lakes that once covered this region. the Salar de Uyuni is 12,000 km2 and sits at a lofty 3,900 meters. Russ and I met a really awsome couple in Uyuni, the guy was from spain and the lady was from france. we also met a wierdo from australia, we booked a one day tour through the salf flats with these guys and it was amazing. we visited a huge volcano that sits on the edge of the flats that had snow on it and a random island in the middle of the flats.

We then took another 6 hour bumpyass, but beautiful ride on dirt mountain roads to Potosi, which is north west of the Salar. Potosi is the highest city in the world, at around 4,000 meters. During colonial times, Potosi was once one of the richest cities in the world becuase right next to it is the largest silver mine in the world. the spanish forced the natives to work as slaves for years extracting the silver and it is said that there was enough silver to build a road from Potosi to Madrid out of silver. Today, we did a tour through the mines and it was insane. really dirty work, the workers drink cane alcohol that is 96 percent and chew coca leaves all day long to keep there energy up. the viens in the mountain are 40 percent pure silver. the number of workers in the mines have been cut from 1800 last year, to just over 6000 this year beacause of the drop in silver prices as a result of the european and american economic desasters.

Russ and I are leaving tomarrow for sucre, 3 hours east, and 3000 meters lower in elevation. We met this awsome guy from alaska who we will be traveling with for the next couple days becuase we are going to climb this mountain outside Sorata with him. the mountain is over 20,000 feet, but requiers no mountainering experience. We will hire guides in la paz, bolivias capital. I have been taking awsome pictures but the internet in bolivia is really slow, I wont be able to upload pics till I get to chile probibly so sit tight. I love all of you, bye bye.

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