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Published: June 30th 2008
Well you´re in for a treat with this blog. Frankly I'm tired of Ant's dulcet tones, so thought that it was probably about time that I put pen to paper.
So thanks to the road being blocked off between Sucre and Uyuni (a regular feature of Bolivian life), we decided to head to Tupiza to try our luck there with getting a tour to the salt flats. Memories of India came flooding back as our bus miraculously made it to our destination for 3am, rather than the expected 7am. Staggering out bleary eyed, we found a taxi, loaded our backpacks into his boot to be ceremoniously dropped off a mere 8 seconds later at our hostel. Well aware that we´d been ripped off and too weary to argue the toss, we were tucked up in bed by 3.10.
We awoke to find that it was ´San Juan´, the Bolivian winter solstice celebration. From what we could see, this celebration involves getting as pissed as you can, then setting off some hideously dangerous fireworks, usually direct from your hand, or failing that stuffing them into terribly unstable bottles, so that you can't quite predict which direction they will fly off
Setting off.....
Yet another road trip for Ant & Jenny. Love it!in. Lubricated with the local drink of warm curdled cream, mixed with a brandy like substance, we had quite a nail biting evening, as rockets and other weird and wonderful fireworks which would never get past trading standards at home, shoot horizontally across the street, whizzing mere inches from the faces of young children, the elderly, dogs...frankly anyone who was foolhardy enough to be out on the roads.
The following morning we began a 4 day tour, which would conveniently take us all the way back up to Uyuni. Ant and I were positively wetting ourselves at the prospect of another road trip, so it was with great excitement that the 6 of us set off (Kirsty and Mike from Wales, our driver/guide and cook). Though to be fair, the cook nearly didn´t make the cut, as I decided early on that her seat up front was preferable to being cramped in the back next to Ant. Once we'd cleared up that little misunderstanding we hit the road. Within an hour our jeep had chugged up a 2km almost vertical climb to 4200m. Even in Sucre at a mere 2500m I´d suffered some mild altitude symptoms, so had wisely
Llama with lovely red earrings
The llamas in Bolivia never leave home without making sure that they look great stocked up on medicine for this trip.....but it didn´t stop me huffing and puffing for air every time we had to get out of the jeep. Just a 5 min stroll, had me feeling like an old woman....alongside the pins & needles in my hands which I had for about quarter of the time. The landscape was pretty impressive though, which was a sufficient distraction. And my, what clever creatures llamas are. Amazingly, they have allocated areas, where they go to the toilet, meaning that you encounter circles of llama poo, but the rest of the field will be poo free. Can you imagine, some of the conversations that must go on......´Larry llama, last night we believe that you had a poo outside of the poo circle, what do you have to say for yourself´. And so forth....
At our first night´s stop, the temperature dropped to minus 10. All well and good if you're living in a well insulated, centrally heated house.....but there was none of that nonsense. For those that live there, it's an incredibly tough life, as temperatures get up to 30 degrees during the day, then can drop to minus 20 at night. To top
At 4855m...
At this altitude Jenny was wondering whether a mobility chair could handle the terrain, as walking and breathing were proving to be tricky it all, most of people we encountered had no electricity or hot water either. You have to be a bloody hardy bugger to survive. Being the big wuzzies that we are, we were tucked up in our sleeping bags, under 5 blankets each by 8pm. But not before making Kirsty and Mike participate in a game of scrabble, which was to be a constant feature of the trip.
Day 2 was to be a biggie (10 hours of driving), so we were up and out by 5.30am. Our first stop was an old abandoned town. Ant and I can understand a reasonable amount of Spanish now, but to prevent us getting too disheartened, if we encounter something that we don't understand, we have a tendency to make it up. Makes for a great game when we're watching the news. Anyway, from what we could understood, this town was abandoned because lots of people started to die, which the townsfolk put down to the influence of the devil - Tio, who happens to be devil god worshiped by the people who work in the mines to hopefully prevent them coming to harm. Anyway, being a superstitious lot, everyone left the
Frozen river
Have I mentioned how cold it was? Even the rivers had frozen town. It was all quite eerie, especially as one guy swore that he'd encountered some unidentifiable creature scurrying through the ruins. Following this, there were more great road trip moments, crossing frozen rivers and yet more smashing landscapes, until we eventually arrived at some hot springs. They were a jolly lovely 35 degrees, but having to change in the outdoors, coupled with a significant wind chill, does leave the old body feeling a bit jolted. In the afternoon we passed lots of weird and wonderful lagoons, then on to some geysers, where our driver decided that it would be a great idea to drop us down wind of the sulphuric gas fumes. Can only imagine that it played havoc with Ant´s brain, as he insisted on waiting around outside for one to ´go off´, whilst the rest of us shivered in the car, wondering what he was up to. Our second night at Laguna Colorada was even colder than the first at 4270m. By this stage, Ant and I were wearing....and sleeping in all of our clothes.
According to the itinerary we´d been given, during the warm season (so not now!), at Laguna Colorado you see masses of flamingos.
The hot tub
Not a bad setting for a hot tub Well astonishingly, there were still a few of them hanging around. You have to question why any of them at all would still be there, given how bloody miserable it was. One can only presume that the ones that remain are insane or too old to make it over to Mexico for the warm weather. Anyway, whatever their reasons it was nice to see them. Though I did want to dash over with a nice warm llama jumper, woolly hat, scarf and gloves, as they did look at wee bit cold. After another day, of looking at the landscape and occasionally getting out of the jeep to take a picture, but only when fully trussed up in winter clothes...I´m talking 2 thermal tops, a cardie, a fleece, windcheater jacket, jeans, long johns, 2 pairs of socks, woolly hat and woolly headband....we arrived at our final night´s accommodation....a salt hotel overlooking the salt flats. Smashing.
So on to our final day. Another early start, this time so that we could watch the sunrise on the salt flats. The salt flats, are quite a surreal experience....it was so cold that it´s not hard to imagine that they're snow or ice, when
Ant trying to recreate the Nirvana album cover...
....silly boy got a cold, which he moaned about for days and days in fact it´s just salt as far as the eye can see. Bizarrely, there are 14 small islands jutting out of them and our first stop was at one of them - Fish Island, which is covered in cacti. Following that, we had an amusing hour where we danced under a giant glitter ball, got chased by a dinosaur and clambered on top of a giant pair of sunglasses. Unbelievable I know. Then it was on to Uyuni where our epic journey of 1000km came to an end.
Now on arrival in Uyuni, things didn´t go quite to plan. Entering our fourth day without a shower, Ant and I were hopeful that we could jump on a bus to the next town (a mere 7 hours away) and check into a nice hotel for a bit of hot shower action. But it wasn't to be, as the next bus was overnight. So we hung around for the day, like the smelly vagrants we´d become, eventually boarding a bus in the evening. And, what an adventure that was. Despite temperatures below freezing, Bolivian buses don't have any heating. We were already wearing all of our clothes when we boarded, so
Rock tree
...the strains of ´Bring your daughter to the slaughter´could be heard when you stood under this rock tree in terms of layers there wasn't really anywhere to go. As an inch of ice appeared on the windows, Ant and I clung to each other like Kate Winslett and Leonado Dicaprio in the final scenes of Titanic. For once our 3am transfer onto another bus was waited for with eager anticipation....a chance to dig out our sleeping bags, from our rucksacks, which were in the holdall. Ant and I clung on to this, giving one another pep talks as our body temperatures dipped to hypothermia levels, as it offered hope that we would in fact survive the night. I´m sure that it´s a regular occurrence for the bus driver to find at least one person who´s unfortunately frozen to death over the course of the night. However, on arrival at our transfer stop, it turns out that the company we´d booked with hadn´t actually bought us a connecting ticket....and if they had the bus had left without us anyway as we were running rather late. The bus driver rather guilty thrust some money into our hands and told us that the next bus was at 6am....leaving us to spend a chilly couple of hours in the bus station. Somehow
Sleeping attire
Jenny thought she´d slip into some sexy lingerie to seduce Ant when everything had been paid, we managed to be 7 Bolivianas up on the transaction (a total of around 50p), which gave us a small amount of joy in our cold, tired and ridiculously smelly state.
So right now, we're in Cochabamba. Somehow, we´ve managed to pick a hostel on funeral street, as there are no less than 10 funeral parlours along our road....but we´re not letting that get us down, as we´re freshly showered...and best of all, it´s warm. I´m currently sat in a t-shirt and the rest of our clothes are in the process of being laundered. They'd probably be better off being incinerated, but hey we´re backpackers on a budget, so we're entitled to be a wee bit scruffy. And, let´s be honest, that´s Ant´s usual look, even in good old London town.
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