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Our night bus from Salta to La Quiaca was uneventful and despite being scheduled to arrive at 8am we arrived at 7am with Sharon and I both disorientated. We soon got our things together and knew it was possible to walk from the bus station across the border and into the Bolivian town Villazon. Whilst it is possible to walk what we hadn't banked on was the Lonely Planet guide map being wrong (or we can't read maps which will be a first for this trip!). Anyway what should have been a 15minute walk took us just over an hour but after asking various locals for directions we found ourselves stood near the front of the queue at the border waiting for it to open.
We were eventually stamped out of Argentina where we promptly had to cross over a bridge, fill in some paperwork and got ourselves stamped into Bolivia. We then had to walk uphill to the bus station so it was a long slow slog since we were at altitude and every step makes you breath as if you have been running in a 100m sprint! This walk also got us to see our first Cholitas. A
Cholita is a Bolivian woman dressed up in traditional clothing that includes a few layers of skirts and a small bowler hat that perches on the top of their head. It is a funny sight to see these women walking down the street especially as they are all a lot shorter than me.....
It soon became apparent that travel in Bolivia was going to be different on the approach to the bus station it was looking like organised chaos and the buses were a sight to behold! We were soon accosted by a guy wanting to sell us a ticket to our next destination for the equivalent of £1 (it was a 4 hour journey) however the only thing on our minds was hunting out a toilet! Having found the bathrooms we were ready to tackle the melee of people and bus companies. Sharon made it clear that she was not going anywhere near the red bus that had been held together by rust and pumping out thick black smoke like it was a factory! Tickets purchased we had an anxious hour wait wondering if our £2.20 tickets had bought us onto a chicken bus - thankfully it hadn't.
The bus journey was interesting in that the bus was often driving on a sideways slant due to the poor roads but it was relatively painless. We arrived in Tupiza and soon found our hostel/hotel.
We booked ourselves onto a 4 day salt flat tour and then wandered around the town trying to change our Argentinian pesos into Bolivianos given the town had no ATM. Unfortunately we got majorly ripped off by the exchange office but there was little we could do about it......
The next morning we got up and joined our tour group. We ended up in a group of 5 so there was Sharon and I and then Krystal and Kristie from Australia and Intia from Switzerland. We were also introduced to our driver/guide and cook for the tour they were husband and wife and called Juan Carlos and Esperanza. We set off on the tour and headed straight into the national park and up into the mountains and desert. Once again the scenery was amazing and the altitude was soon taking its toll as we climbed to over 4000m! That night we stopped in a local village and ended up staying in very basic
accommodation with the walls made out of mud bricks and the roof out of leaves. There was no electricity however thankfully there was a fully operational toilet!
Unfortunately my memories of the rest of the tour are vague as I became ill. I still don't know what I had but believe it was a mixture of a cold, virus and altitude sickness. Basically the second and third days of the tour I ended up sleeping constantly in the back of the jeep occasionally waking up to see the view. On the fourth day I began to feel a bit more human and was able to appreciate the salt flats and join in on the various perspective photos that you are able to take on the flats.
On the afternoon of the fourth day we arrived in Uyuni where Sharon and I checked ourselves into a hotel making sure it had a bathroom and tv so we could hole ourselves up for the night as there was little in the town and the temperature at night in Bolivia plunges to below -10 and they don't have any heating.
Saturday we booked ourselves onto the night bus to La Paz
and I spent the rest of the day either sleeping or just lying in the sun on a bench in the street. Our original plan had been to head to Potosi however due to my illness and suspected altitude sickness we had to put it to one side as Potosi is the highest city in the world at over 3600m.
Thankfully we had booked ourselves onto the tourist bus to La Paz so whilst expensive it was relative luxury for Bolivia. Next stop La Paz......
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rachel
non-member comment
Cant be bothered to go back to yahoo!
WOW WOW WOW These salt flats look amazing! :-)