Late last night I got back from an amazing five-day trip with thirteen other volunteers from all over the world to Uyuni, home of Bolivia´s legend salt flats. Here is some commentary and pictures of the trip. All of my pictures can be found on
Picasa.
Friday, February 4th
It was raining super hard when we all awoke, met up, and made our way to the bus station for our 9 o’clock bus. From Cochabamba, we traveled four hours to Oruro, getting there by lunch time. We ate, then boarded our train to Uyuni, a seven hour trip. The highlights of that afternoon were being forced to listen to Hotel California five times and watch several different Jackie Chan movies. Bolivian public transportation makes sure to provide you with very, very loud entertainment the entire time you travel. We got to Uyuni late at night, found out that our hostel had decided to ignore our reservation, found another, and crashed.
Saturday, February 5th
We got up early to look for tour operators. The standard procedure for exploring the salt flats and surrounding area is to book jeep tours that come with everything included for about 100 dollars per person. We ended up cramming fourteen people into two jeeps, which was super uncomfortable for the people in the back. We first went to a “train cemetery,” which is a spooky way of saying an abandoned train, a remembrance of the mining boom in that area. Our guide also let us in on his life story; how he survived a mining accident, why he has no teeth, and why his nickname is llama (because both he and male llamas have over fourteen females).
We then ate llama meat for lunch at a little outpost on the road.
We then drove some more before coming to these cool rock formations. One of the most entertaining parts of this was a huge group of gringos that had formed two circles and were chanting “pachamama,” which means Mother Earth in Andean traditions, while playing Native American drums from the States as well as a didgeridoo. Meanwhile, all of the Bolivian drivers were sitting on rocks laughing at the spectacle.
We spent the night at a little house in the middle of nowhere, where we were treated to traditional music by school children.
Sunday, February 6th
We got up and went to the Red Lagoon, so named for the color that it takes when sunny. All over the tour we saw tons of flamingos, and this lake was no exception.
After lunch we saw some geyser and hot pots. Our guide got really excited by the whole thing, dropped his pants and underwear, and decided to warm his butt and genitals with one of the steam vents. I didn’t get a picture of him doing this, but you can tell he really likes steam vents from the picture below. The whole thing was like Yellowstone, without any rules or boardwalks. You could see some places where people had almost fallen into one of the formations.
Then we went to a hot spring where we got to bathe for about a half an hour.
We then saw more lagoons, including Green Lagoon, before going to our new “hostel.” We spent that night at 5,000 meters (16,400 feet) above sea level.
Monday, February 7th
We got up super early and saw more rock formations and drove through more desert.
The whole time we were really rushing so that we could have time to get to the actual salt flat. This time of year the whole thing is covered in water, which our driver was not super happy about because it’s hell on the car. It was incredible, the whole thing reflected the sky perfectly and I had never seen anything like it before.
Our guide got excited again and took off his pants...
Tuesday, February 8th
We got back from the salt flat that night, and waited in the train station for a couple of hours after eating since our train was supposed to leave at 1:20 am. We all boarded what we thought was our train at one, and just passed out we were so tired. We got up at like 6 am to realize that we hadn't moved. Apparently, the rain had kept the rest of train from showing up, which the car we spent the night in was supposed to attach to. We ended up leaving at 8:20, only a seven hour delay. We got back to Oruro at around four pm, and promptly boarded another bus. Two hours into that trip, however, the bus broke down. We waited and watched Jackie Chan for two more hours, until another bus came and picked us up. While we had planned on getting back to Cochabamba at like 2 in the afternoon, I was back at my house by midnight. It was, to say the least, a long day.
Hope all is well! I only have two and half more weeks here, which is out of control. This has gone insanely fast.
Abraços,
Cameron
if some student of travel in bolivia read both our blogs on this trip and had to write what the common impression was, I think the obvious answer would be: Salar de Uyuni=Jackie Chan.
ReplyDeleteInteresting.