Advertisement
Johaan finally arrived to La Paz on Monday night! The next two days I showed him around to the Hospital del Nino, my home stay, and the areas that I have called home for the last two months. On Wednesday, we got on a 14 hour over night bus to Salar de Uyuni. The Salar de Uyuni is the world's largest salt flat, totaling 4,086 square meters near the crest of the Andeas. The area used to be a part of a giant lake about 42,000 years ago. Now there are several lagoons, dry desert areas, and lots of salt. Johaan and I started our 4wd three day tour in the town of Uyuni on Thursday morning. Along with us, there was another couple from Norway, a guy from China, a guy from Chile, and our guide Max and his wife/our cook Anna. On Thursday we headed out into the desert, first stopping at the old train cemetery. This railway was built in 1892 primarily for trains carrying minerals to Pacific Ocean ports and for mining companies. However, when the mining industry collapsed, many of the trains were abandoned and thus producing the train cemetery. After the cemetery we headed out
The Train Cemetary
These are old trains that were stationed here and then never left.to the expansive salt flats, had lunch, and had a lot of fun experimenting with different perspective pictures. After lunch, we went to Incahuasi Island (Fish Island), to see some giant cacti. The island is in the middle of the salt flats and is inhabited by lots of cacti and rocks, quite the opposite terrain of the smooth, white salt flats that surround this small island. After the island, we drove to the salt hotel where we were going to spend our first night. The whole hotel is pretty much built out of salt blocks. The tables, chairs, walls, and flooring is all salt. Surprisingly, the salt walls acted as an okay insulator considering the temperature can drop to below 0 degrees fahrenheit at night.
The next morning, we headed out to the various lagoons in the desert where the scenery changes from salt to volcanoes and mountains. We drove through a small town called San Juan and stopped at the Red Lagoon, the Canapa Lagoon, and the Hedionda Lagoon. Strangely, one of the lagoons serves as a popular breading area for pink flamingos. After seeing the flamingos, we began driving to El Disierto de Siloli where there were
massive rock formations, including the famous Tree Stone. On the way however, we stopped once for about 45 minutes because two cars in front of us had flat tires, and then again for about 2 hours because another car had messed up one of its shocks and our guide was nice enough to get out and help them. We finally arrived at our second place to stay the night. This place was unfortunately a lot colder. After freezing during the night, we woke up at 5:30 am and headed out to see the geysers and to visit the hot springs. The hot springs were amazing!!!! Since it was freezing outside, the 85 degree hot spring was a perfect ending to our 3 day adventure through the desert. After breakfast, we drove to two other lagoons and then were dropped off at the border of Chili. We then took a small bus to San Pedro de Atacama, Chile.
San Pedro de Atacama is a very small desert town. We excitedly found a hotel and took our first showers in three days. After resting and regrouping, Johaan and I went out and explored the small town and had lunch. Later that
night, we went out to dinner for Johaan's birthday and had an amazing set menu dinner of Chilian sea bass. We are now waiting to get on our 24-hr bus to Valparaiso, Chile. We paid the extra money for a full cama seat on the bus that goes completely flat, so hopefully it will be a pretty comfortable ride :D Oh, and Happy 4th of July!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.107s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 11; qc: 49; dbt: 0.0364s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Lisa Lonsdale
non-member comment
What a trip
I am enjoying following your travels. I especially like the perspective pics. Have fun with the rest of it. Looking forward to you next blog. Aunt Lisa