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Published: September 17th 2010
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When we left Puno, we got a bus across the Bolivian border to Copacabana. We more or less got a boat straight away to Isle del Sol on Lake Titicaca. Getting off the boat, we were greeted by loads of little children trying to bring us to their family's hostel. We ignored most of them and walked about half an hour up a very steep hill, with rucksacks attached, to a hostel that was recommended to us. It was worth it, as the views were spectacular from the hostel. That evening, we just went for a short trek to the south tip of the island. The following morning, we got up at about 6am and trekked the length of the island and back. We didn't meet anybody until about 10am. It was a really nice walk with changing views of the lake along the way.
We got the boat times mixed up and ended up at the wrong port! However, we did manage to tag along with a private tour and got back to Copacabana safely and caught a bus to La Paz straight away.
La Paz is a crazy city in every sense! We just decided to unwind there
for most of a week and enjoy a few nights out. We were staying in an Irish owned hostel which was really good fun.
Walking around the city was a bit mental....even crossing the street was hard work! There are pedestrian lights but I think they are just decoration to be honest.
We did a mountain biking tour down "The Worlds Most Dangerous Road", also known as Death Road, which got it´s name from the number of fatalities on the road. Prior to 2006 (when the new road opened) there were about 300 deaths a year and that was with only about 20 cars a day using the road. The cycle down was made all the more daunting by the sight of all these headstones along the side of the road! The cycle is 63km long and starts off at 4900m altitude and goes all the way down to 1100m. The first section is just on normal tarmac road which allowed us to get used to the bikes. Then we hit Death Road which is a steep downhill cycle on a 3 metre wide dirt track with absolutely no guard rails along the huge cliff! Very interesting!
Unfortunately, the
day we did the tour, the weather was very unseasonal and it poured rain on us the whole way down. Also, it was really foggy so we didn't get to appreciate the views along the road. The cycle was still really cool and it got the adrenaline pumping! At the end of the cycle we ended up at an animal refuge which was also really nice. We saw more animals there than we did in the jungle in 4 days!!
We managed to see the All Ireland hurling final in our hostel even though it took about 6 hours to get it going due to the really bad Bolivian internet service. Aw well, it just made for a longer day in the bar which finished in the early hours.
We decided after about 6 nights in La Paz that it was time to snap out of lazy mode and get back on the road! So we caught an overnight bus to Uyuni which was the starting point for our 3 day tour of Southwest Bolivia.
We didn´t hang around Uyuni and about 3 hours after getting off our shaky bus from La Paz, we were bundled into the
back of a Toyota Landcruiser along with 4 others and headed for the worlds largest salt flats (Salar de Uyuni). The first stop on the tour was at a train cemetery just outside Uyuni which is a graveyard in the middle of the desert, full of rusting old steam trains from the late 19th century.
Then to the salt flats.....the shear vastness of the saltflats were amazing. We saw how the locals worked with the salt and surprisingly there is not a huge business from them and nothing is exported. The next biggest industry they are trying to break into is battery production as there is a very high quantity of lithium to be extracted from the salt planes.
That night, we stayed in a Salt Hotel, where literally everything is made from salt! Really cool! The following day we continued further on our trip and we were continuously driving through changing landscapes with some cool geological formations, caves, lagoons and we spotted some flamengos, andean foxes and other types of birds. That night we stayed at approx 5,000m and it was freezing so we put on most of the clothes in our rucksack and managed to get
some sleep.
On the final day of the trip we started off with a visit to some geysers. These smell pretty bad and are boiling at about 80C. Then we went to some natural hot springs which were amazing....just what the body needed! Much better than Aguas Calientes after the Inca Trail! One of the last stops was at Laguna Verde which was pretty impressive. Then it was time to head for the Chilean border where we passed through Salvador Dali desert.
When we got to Chile, we arrived in a small town called San Pedro de Atacama.This is pretty much a tourist hub full of people finishing the tour of Southwest Bolivia or starting in the opposite direction. It was still a really nice town and obviously much more advanced (and expensive) than Bolivia. We stayed here for a couple of nights and tried our hand at some sandboarding.
My sandboarding experience lasted less than 15 minutes. About 10 minutes to climb up the dune, 2 minutes instructions from the guide, 2 minutes to get strapped into the board and then 10 seconds to fly down the dune and then crash; out popped my dodgy shoulder...again!
Colette did look over to make sure I was still alive before she headed back up the dune to perfect her sandboarding skills! I put myself back together and spent the rest of the time taking a few photos of Colette. It´s a really cool sport but could take a long time to perfect it.
We enjoyed some nice Chilean food and wine in San Pedro before catching a bus to Salta, Argentina the following day.
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Claire
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Hey you two, looks like ure still havin a ball. Must say, whoever is taking the photos r doin a very good job! so wheres next??