We boarded a local bus in La Paz in the morning. It was in a worst state than the buses in Ecuador! The chairs were stained, the paint was chipped all over, the door held together by tape and the driver had a sickly hacking cough. Luckily we got the front seat with more leg room but our window had a hideous constant rattle of metal on glass that irked the nerves. After 4 long hours we got off the bus in an uninspiring town called Oruro in the desert. We got on a train which took 7 hours to Uyuni. The train was rather rocky and Andrew hated it. Still I think it would’ve been better than the bus on a dirt & gravel road overnight! I was kept entertained by watching 2 kids movies (dubbed in Spanish with English sub titles as usual).
The view from the train was meant to be incredible but I didn’t think it was particularly special, just lots of barren land. The sunset looked like it was going to be phenomenal but our windows fogged up and it poured with rain. It was still raining with cold winds when we arrived in Uyuni. We ran across the street to a hostel (along with most people) and managed to get a room and went straight to sleep. My only requirement at this hostel was that it had hot showers because it would cost to shower on the tour. The next morning we changed some money to Chilean pesos and went to our tour operator’s office – Tunupa Tours, booked through Kanoo Tours in La Paz. It’s cheaper to book a tour once you’re in Uyuni but due to the holiday season and all the companies closing down for Christmas, we pre-booked.
Our tour group consisted of a Swiss lady Lillian and 2 young Portuguese couples – Marta &Rafa, Añes & Gonsalo, us and our driver. Our driver was just that – he wasn’t much of a guide, he didn’t even introduce himself. He only spoke to us when necessary and only in Spanish. Our vehicle was a sturdy land cruiser 4 wheel drive with temperamental windows, our bags strapped to the roof and us all jammed in cozy together. We stopped at a little dusty town called Colchani to buy souvenirs if we wished, along with at least 15 other land cruisers containing tour groups, then we headed out into the spectacular Salt Flats – Salar De Uyuni.
It’s the largest desert of white salt in the world stretching for as far as the eye could see with mountains shimmering like mirages in the distance. We stopped at one area where workers were creating pyramid piles of salt to collect. By doing this, puddles of water were created and the pyramids reflect a buzzy mirror image. Further on into the surreal salt flats, the salt is dried in almost hexagon like shapes. Here we did the obligatory trick photography shots where you can make a bottle or a shoe the same size as a person by having them positioned at different distances. There was a little building made of salt there and I tried to stay in its shade as it was extremely hot. Here our driver made us lunch from the back of the land cruiser.
Afterwards we stopped at a train graveyard before driving a few hours through dry desert with dead looking grass and loads of rubbish, to a red desert surrounded by red clay type mountains to a little dusty town called Villa Alota. The place was like a ghost town with only a handful of criss crossing streets and 2 other car loads of people also on tour but with the company Oasis. Before dinner we chatted to some of them and it was such an extreme mix of languages and accents. French, Swedish, Portuguese, Spanish, German and English. Luckily for us English is the easiest language for everyone to communicate with each other.
We didn’t expect much from a Bolivian tour. We knew it would be bare bones basic but learning how Oasis runs their tours and for the same price made it a little sore for us. They had their own cook and their food looked delicious, their driver was an actual friendly guide and told them what was happening each day (our driver had disappeared by this point for a booty call and we hadn’t even been told what time we were supposed to get up in the morning, although the next morning he seemed to be in better spirits lol), some of them got private rooms (we were in a big dorm all together) and they only had 6 people per vehicle so were a lot more comfortable. Still, if Tunupa was the only company left to do the tour with id still say go as the landscapes you see is totally worth the down fall. Due to being the rainy season we were unable to go to Isla Pescado to see the giant cacti or stay in the salt hotel which is on the original itinerary which was unfortunate, but Kanoo tours did give me a heads up about this.
The next morning we got up at 7am to be served stale bread and jam (when the other group got pancakes and yogurt fruit cups). This day marked the half way point for us on our entire trip through Mexico and South America (one week short of 3 months to be exact). Las Vegas, where we started on the 1st Oct 2011, feels like forever ago! I have to admit that another 3 months to go is a little daunting and exhausting. It’s hard to be excited about each place as travelling has become a way of life now but I know I’m still going to love and enjoy every day and remember the memories very fondly. I’m just super excited about home because I’ve been away for 15 months and I want to see everyone – plus getting to unpack, shop at normal supermarkets, not having to worry about booking buses or accommodation and earning money again instead of spending it...
Anyways, today was the day for awe inspiring scenery. We started off by driving through a fascinating place of crazy red rock formations – some of which the shapes reminded me of vertebrae’s of a spine. After some photo ops, we drove through the Siloli Desert with slabs of red rock and tufts of yellow and brown plants decorating the vast space in the middle of no where. It was stunning but the road was very rough! It was like being in a vibrating motion master for a few hours. We passed llamas and vicunas and stopped at a lagoon inhabited by hundreds of pink flamingos with a dramatic backdrop of volcanic rock mountains which were streaked with reds, grays and blacks with a sprinkling of snow. The lagoon itself wasn’t overly pretty, it was streaked with white and green sediments but the mountains reflections were neat.
We past more lagoons and impressive mountains and went through a vast gravel desert, stopping at Arbol De Piedra which is a rock that’s kind of shaped like a tree. It really did feel like we were in the middle of no where except for the rows of tire tracks ingrained into the deserts dust. We drove for 3 hours in total this day and due to the rugged conditions, I was thankful for it to end early! We stayed at a lodge on the edge of Laguna Colorado – a red watered lagoon home to more flamingos and stunning red mountains at an altitude of 4278m (higher than where we slept on the Inca Trail). After lunch we went for a walk up a small hill to get a better view of the lake and it was unreal - Piles of salt looking like mini glaciers and the mountains reflections in the colorful waters. Unfortunately it was windy (but not cold) and there were an abundance of bugs – I accidently ate a fly and I was not impressed! Not a pleasant experience....
The lodge was in amongst a few other buildings on the lake side and it was very basic with no running water. We had to flush the toilet with a bucket of water which a lot of people didn’t do so the smell was atrocious along with the rubbish bins full of toilet paper covered in feces... (which unfortunately is the case everywhere in Latin America). We were allocated another dorm room and the beds were literally 10cm away from each other! Our Portuguese friends taught us a fun card game which kept us entertained until dinner.
Our final morning we awoke at 4.30am to have breakfast and to see the sunrise at the Geysers. Unfortunately due to our food and driver never being on time for the entire trip, we saw the sun rise at the lagoon. Still, it was really stunning seeing the sky streaked with orange and red over the water. We drove to the Geysers which is hot steam shooting up out of craters in the ground (usually with bubbling mud but I didn’t see any of that). We have these in NZ, but for safety reasons you cant get close to them. Here there are no roped off areas or instructions not to get too close, people were walking through the craters!
Afterwards we stopped off at some natural hot springs situated at the edge of a lagoon. As the sun was still climbing in the sky, Lillian, Rafa, Marta and I got in along with many other groups and it was deliciously warm. However it was awkward getting changed afterwards with no privacy out in the open! We drove through more incredible rock deserts for a short time with volcanic landscapes to Laguna Verde – a spectacular green colored lagoon resting in front of a volcano. Sadly, not long after this, our trip came to an end. We were dropped off at the Bolivian border where for the first time we had to pay for an exit stamp. It was just a little office with nothing else in sight. We said our goodbyes to Lillian and our diver as they were heading back to Uyuni. The rest of us crammed into an over full van to head to San Pedro De Atacama in Chile.
I have to admit it was fantastic being back on a tar sealed road free from breathing in plumes of road dust and sand! We went downhill looking out over the vast Atacama Desert – the driest in the world. At the Chilean border we had to fill out custom declaration forms and get our bags scanned which was a first in South America when entering by land! Chile is set to be the first Latin American country to be declared a first world country. It has a relatively low poverty rate and it seems to have its government sorted. This is a nice change but it also means prices for everything increase by double... We checked into our hostel and did all the necessary chores such as laundry, supermarket shopping and buying bus tickets.
San Pedro is a nice little desert town with dusty dirt roads and adobe walls. It’s completely targeted at the tourist industry so there are an overwhelming amount of restaurants, shops and tourist agencies offering tours. After a fantastic sleep once again in a private room, we hired bikes with our Portuguese friends and rode through the surrounding desert in the boiling hot sun. The scenery was fantastic and it was awesome being out amongst it instead of in a vehicle. We followed a gravel road curling its way around a stream and through rugged red mountains and lush green trees. Thankfully with my riding skill level, it was all flat but the ground was bumpy with gravel and with sticky sand patches that sucked down the wheels. We never found the view points the bike agency told us about which was a bit anti climatic but it was still worth the effort to see more of the areas nature.
Back in town we had a much deserved ice cream then spent the rest of the day relaxing. Unfortunately at 1am I woke up not feeling well – what a wonderful Christmas present! So for the next 2 days we didn’t really achieve much. At this point I was dreadfully missing my laptop for my link to the outside world and for entertainment purposes. We’ve been doing a lot of reading! It didn’t feel like Christmas at all without friends and family. There was a sad looking xmas tree in the main square which hinted at the holiday but nowhere else had decorations.
On the 27th Dec we boarded as bus that took 23 hours to Santiago. The view to begin with was mind blowing - Desert with mountains in shades of pinks, purples, reds, oranges and grays. The rest of the journey that we could see in daylight was rather uninspiring. The bus was relatively comfortable and it wasn’t as bad as I expected, but still, 23 hours is a long time! The bus stopped in Antofagasta so we could buy dinner and we saw the beach for the first time in a month. Yay! The bus was supposed to supply breakfast but it was pitiful - A biscuit and a small cup of peach juice. What?! Note: Always take snacks with you on long bus rides. Luckily, we were prepared.....
(Later in our trip, we met an english couple that had done the same tour 2 weeks after us. where we had desert, they had snow!! How bizarre! They also had a good enough driver to take them through the part that was closed due to the rainy season. Our driver wasnt the best but weve heard horror storys of people having drivers that argue with them, speed, get lost in the salt flats and had to get helicoptered out, as well as the car breaking down or people even dieing from flipping the landcruiser! So we were lucky really!)
