The road from Potosi to Uyuni, was probably one of the most potholed we have come across this holiday. In most parts the road was sand and we were chugging along it in a full sized coach, with windows that would not open - in the desert, I ask you?!!
Uyuni has little on offer, except the ubiquitous pizzerias and travel agencies, but once our teeth had stopped chattering from the ride, we went to explore. We went to a few agencies, which all seemed to offer the same thing at slightly different prices. Our heads spinning, we bumped into our Belgian friends, Odelle and Nicolas, whom we had spent time with in Sucre and Potosi. They recommended us a company and we went with them.
Our tour began at the reasonable time of 10.30am the next day, which gave us time to call the banks and report our stolen money to the Fraud Squad. £20 well spent as we both had our money returned the same day.
We had an excellent group of seven, including our fantastic guide, Rodrigo. It consisted of Clarissa and Vlad, a couple from Brasil and Charles and Nathan, two friends from San Francisco and of course us! We had a fab few days with them and sincerely hope to stay in touch. This tour was definitely one of the best things we have done in nine months.
Anyway, I am waffling now, so on with the photos.
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| Our first stop was the train graveyard. Dozens of old rusting trains in the middle of the desert. |
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| We had lunch on the first day at the Salt Hotel. It has a bad ecological record and it is recommended not to visit there, but it was impossible to find a tour that didn't go there. The toilet cost 50p (extortionate in Bolivia) and was the most disgusting toilet we have ever had the pleasure of visiting!. The British flag was missing, so sorry New Zealanders, we had to bastardise yours. |
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At the edge of the salt flats, you see plenty of these piles of salt, which are piled up by the locals to dry and then they collect them.
We think these ones by the hotel were especially made for tourists to make silly poses on. |
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| Erlend gets everywhere. |
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| Inside the salt hotel, another silly photo. The bricks are made from salt. |
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We drove to an island in the salt. The photos nor any word I could write do the stunning, surreal view justice.
You just have to come here! |
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| L-R Vlad, Clarissa, Me, Richard, Nate and Charles. |
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| Compulsory beers at the first hostel. |
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| Our album cover. |
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| Perhaps the second album cover... |
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Could this be one of the most picturesque places for a picnic lunch?
Our fab guide made all our food. |
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| The colour of this lake was just unbelievable, but it was very windy, so we didn't stay long to look at the flamingoes! |
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Dinner on the second night.
We went outside to look at the stars - we had never seen anything like it (this is the best place in the world for star watching - no light pollution and hardly any days with cloud cover). Again, impossible to describe with my limited vocabulary. It was bloody freezing though. |
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| Charles enjoyed doing handstands in dangerous places, but he made it back in one piece (we think, we left him and Nate at the Chile border). |
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| We love this photo. |
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| We left at 4am on the final day to see the geysers. No health and safety here. |
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| Breakfast by the hot springs. It was still bloody freezing and I had packed my fleece away. |
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Vlad, Richard and Charles enjoy a hot soak.
One woman was topless (she must have been European!),I turne to the man next to me and sarcastically said 'Oh, I'm British, I don't know where to look'. His fantastic retort was: 'I'm an Australian man, I know exactly where to look!'. |
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We spent the next couple of days in San Pedro de Atacama in Chile with Clarissa and Vlad.
It was really sad to say goodbye to everyone from our trip.
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