The Salt Plains

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I know we keep saying it but the Salt Plains in Bolivia were another highlight of our trip. It was absolutely fantastic and we got a load of amazing pics. I won´t write too much as the pictures can describe the sites much better than I can--but as always the pictures dont do the place justice, it was just amazing.



The journey started off with an overnight bus journey which took about 13 hours. The bus was actually pretty nice with good reclining seats, unfortunately after midnight we were on very bumpy unpaved roads so it was not that easy to sleep. We slept well enough though and arrived in Uyuni around 8:30 and joined our tour just after 10:00--there were 6 of of total in the group. The tour company we went with was called Blue Line which was good for us. The guide was more of a driver than a guide and did not speak much english. But we had been told this so did not mind, we did have two argentinian ladies on our tour who translated a lot of what he said. The food was all very good and the accomodation was basic dorms but good enough.



First stop was to see a train graveyard which was a bit average but on the way so worth taking a look at. It was just as it sounds, a load of dead unused trains stuck in the sand. From there we got to the salt plains which were just amazing. All you could see was blue (from the sky) and white for as far as you could see. Then we got to an island, the salt was all a lake at one point and this little island was still made of sand, with loads of huge cacti/cactuses growing on it. The island was surrounded by white salt. That night we watched a beautiful sunset before sleeping in our salt hotel.



Next day we left the salt plains and did lots of driving though the desert. The elevation was still very high--about 4,600 meters (I think). We saw a volcano (6,000 meters high), a red lake, some funny little rabbit type animals, loads of flamingos on lakes, and lots of very interesting landscapes along the way.



The third day we were up around 4:30 and on the road by 5am so that we could get to the gysers. This was this highlight of the tour. It was def on of the most amazing things we have ever seen. We were at a very high elevation (about 4,500 meters) so it was very cold (0 degress C) but you could see the water from the earth literally boiling with steam spraying up everywhere. Just amazing. From there we went to a natural hot spring and striped down to our bathing suits even though we could see ice on the ground. It was very nice even once in the water but cold getting in and out. After breakfast we went to a green lake and saw a few more interesting sites and then from there we crossed into Chile. We could really combine blog entries for the next stop as it was similar but there are so many pics from both places we thought we would do another entry.

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