Salt deserts, lagoons and good people

The last several days have been excellent. I made it to Tupiza after Potosí without too much more hassle than can be expected in this part of the world... which means that we sat at a construction roadblock for four hours because we missed the ¨times of passage¨ by one hour. Oy. It meant that I arrived in the dark without dinner instead of at 4pm, but these things do happen! I found a good place to stay and the next day managed to organise a tour to the Uyuni salt flats with a recommended company. We left the following morning in a four by four jeep, with four passengers, a driver and a cook. And two tanks of gas strapped to the roof rack, because there wouldn´t be another gas station for four days. Isolated and beautiful landscapes ensued...

We started by looking at the Sillar de la Luna, which were a set of volcanic rock formations similar to the ones I posted pictures of earlier near the Colca Canyon in Peru, but in (muted) rainbow colours instead of white. Stark and beautiful. We wound our way through a number of very small hamlets on the way to our hospedaje for the night. At one of them Ian and a few of the other guys on our tour played football with some local kids -- fun. I showed them a picture on my camera that I´d taken of them and soon had the whole crew jostling for position to see all the pictures on my camera. We did a lot of driving the first day, so that on the second day we could get up a little later and yet still see all the lagoons etc on the agenda. Seemed a good compromise to me. The first night was cold -- I could not get my feet to warm up regardless of what I did -- I was terribly jealous of all the snores emanating from my dorm/jeep mates...

The second day was full full full. We drove through the Salvador Dali desert (so named for the bizarre melting rocks and the colourful mountains bordering it). We stopped at several lagoons, of which two in particular were stunning. The Laguna Verde was aquamarine and devoid of life. The colour is from mercury, lead and a lovely cocktail of other toxic chemicals. I´ll post a picture as soon as I can find an internet cafe that has USB connections -- Uyuni doesn´t seem so well equipped in that regard! We finished the day at Laguna Colorada, which turns bright red in the sun from the algae that live in the warm waters. The local flamingo colony was gorgeous, too. That night we slept at 4600 metres -- I was SO glad for the hot water bottles that our guide and cook provided, and slept well through the night.

Day three saw us drive to the edge of the Uyuni salt flats. We saw an active volcano (from a distance), a number of truly bizarre rock formations created by erosion -- the most spectacular of which is known as the Arbol de Piedre, or the Stone Tree. Very cool. The lads on our two jeeps had a moment of testosterone-filled entertainment there as they summitted every climbable formation in sight... Amusing all around. We also saw a number of smaller lagoons, and got to get quite close to one colony of flamingoes at a local ecolodge. So beautiful and graceful. For the evening we opted to drive an hour closer to the edge of the flats so that seeing the sunrise wouldn´t involved getting up at 4:00. We got up at 5am instead!

The final hostal was made of salt. The walls, beds, tables and chairs were made of salt blocks, and the floor was a crunchy layer of white rock salt. Quite cool (and kind of cold, to be honest). We played rounds of Asshole and Shithead (yes, lovely names that travelling card games have, aren´t they??) until about 10 and then crashed in anticipation of an early morning.

The sunrise was spectacular. The flats themselves are thick -- 145 metres deep (and probably deeper), with interesting hexagonal shapes carved into the surface by offgassing lithium (they export it). It was so cold that it was hard not to think we were standing on a huge frozen lake instead of a salt plain. But the colours slowly came up, turning first the sky, then the mountains and finally ourselves purple, pink and finally yellow. We then went to one of the islands in the salt flat and hiked around -- there was a cactus there that was over 9 metres tall and 900 years old. Another, 12 metres tall and 1232 years old had only died last year. Magnificent. Shenanigans on the salt flat ensued -- trick photos and goofiness all around. Fun. Visits to the salt hotel and museum were less interesting, but still good.

I decided to stay in Uyuni for tonight instead of taking the jeep back to Tupiza -- it is Steve´s birthday (a tour member) and going out with good people tonight sounded more fun than a six hour drive on a dodgy road. I´ll take the train tomorrow night down to Villazón and then a bus into Argentina. Should be good. And hopefully in an Argentinian internet cafe I´ll actually be able to upload the photos that should have accompanied this post...