Advertisement
Published: February 6th 2008
Okay, so our 7 - 20 hour bus ride ended up being 10 hours. We were doing really well until we came to the big river crossing. We all had to get out to lighten the load before the bus driver tried to negociate the dry, but very soft, river bed. As we made our way across, we all had a good chuckle at another bus that was bogged. Well we all laughed too soon, because as we turned around we saw our bus drive about 20 metres into the river bed and get stuck. Just great. After about 20min of digging and pushing our bus was free and off it went.......and then got stuck about 50 metre away. Crap. We tried and tried to get it but it just kept sinking and sinking. In the end the back was all the way down to the axle. It was about 7pm, getting dark and the sky was threatening rain. We were told that we were probably going to spend the night here. Just great. So much for 7 hours on the bus. Luckily after about half an hour of standing around they decided to try again. We dug and dug and
dug, then lined the tracks with plants and stones. We only had one chance to get it right, so every one was praying that this attempt would work. With our fingers crossed we pushed as hard as we could and finally we got the bus free. So after 10 hours we finally arrived in Uyuni.
The only real reason why Uyuni exists is to service the tourists that venture out to the salares. It is a pretty bland and boring town as we found out pretty quick. As we arrived late at night we got up early to book a three day trip starting that day. I was with a couple from Australia (Bridget and Russell) and a Swiss girl (Karin). We were all keen to book a trip from Uyuni to Tupiza, but due to it being a rainy season, no operator was willing to do it for us. It seemed a bit strange because there were tours running from Tupiza to Uyuni. I guess this is Bolivia, and things aren´t alway quite right,
Anyway we booked a three day trip with ´Wonderful Tours´starting from Uyuni, visting the Salar de Uyuni, Laguna Colorado, Sol de Manana and
Laguna Verde. Well this is what they told us any way. We didn´t have an english speaking guide so really we had no idea what we visited. But even though we struggled with the Spanish, we had a really good time. I think we had the best jeep in the place (nice leather seats and an Ipod converter) the food was great and the scenery unbelievable. It was a long three days sitting in the jeep, but I guess that is the only way you can see everything. I will let the pictures do all the talking for this blog, but remember they never do any place justice.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.054s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 7; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0301s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
