Getting High On The Salt Flats
Trip Start
Sep 29, 2007
1
98
221
Trip End
Ongoing
Uyuni,
Bolivia
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
The Bolivian Easter Bunny put a show in on Sunday morning before we set off towards the Bolivian border for the cross into the desert. The crew on board were Leonard and Brian from Ireland and Linnley and Dikkons from Zimbabwe and England, total of six passengers plus the driver and cook, the drivers wife. There was another friendly passenger Luka, who doesnīt live on the second floor by the way, who changed groups at the border. The vehicle had a three tree air freshener arrangement swinging from his rear vision mirror so we were okay if no-one got a shower in.
The border was an easy stamp in stamp out affair. The Bolivian border was located in the desert, marked by the colourful Bolivian flag and manned by two guards who stamped us in with a smile then ripped us off changing our Chilien pesos into Bolivianos at an inflated exchange rate, their rate. There was an old bus carcass adjacent to the border hut and you couldnīt help but think that this was one that hadnīt made it through the desert. We had heard that 4WD drivers fall asleep at the wheel and that the vehicles are poorly maintained causing many breakdowns in the desert.
Easter Bunny In The Desert
If our driver had zero personality, he sure made up for it with his impeccable and flawless driving skills, demonstrated over sometimes rugged terrain. We are not sure of our drivers name because he didnīt speak at all and only gave standard directions in Spanish on when to eat, sleep and shit. Luckily for us, we got by with our limited Spanish and knew what was going on most of the time. For the first day, the driver constantly chewed on coca leaves and that must have kept him alert and supposedly helps with the effects of altitude. There was an immediate feeling of being in Bolivia which has a much more Latin America feel than its neighbours we have been recently spoiled by. The travelling will be alot more challenging and rugged but cheaper and the rewards greater. andWe stopped at the Sol de Manana geyser. The boiling pools and craters holes of bubbling mud and sulphur are set at an altitude of 5000metres and resembled landscape on Mars. The possibilities are endless in the desert and anything can happen because it started snowing there at the geysers!!! We were entirely excited about this and immediately had visions of a snowball fight but we were only presented with a few flakes. By the way, we were completely wrong to assume that deserts are hot all the time like in the cartoons, completely wrong, we wore every piece of clothing out there.
We stopped at Laguna Polques where we paddled our legs in a warm hot springs pool in which water would spout from underground on the bottom then flow back out to the lake.
Bolivia / Chile Border Cross
The driver and cook would wander off behind a hill or into some pampas grasses and engage in suspicious behaviour, we never found out what they did back there but we suspect they were drinking. We visited the emerald green coloured Laguna Verde that owes its colour to arsenic and minerals.We passed through desolate high Andean scenery and passed herds of llama, vicuna and even one road runner. Some of he llama have cute pink bows of dyed hair tied to their ears to mark them to a particular herd, gay llamas! The graceful vicuna are endangered animals and we took great delight when they would cross the path in front of the 4WD or run away from the noise of the engine. It was a shame we missed the sighting of the solo road runner, Dikkons was the only one to see it and we are told it was knee height with long legs. The 4WD would leave a trail of dust behind us at it zipped through the desert playing Bolivian folk music. We were all starting to feel the effects of the altitude on our bodies as we climbed higher. We felt tired and our heart rates were faster.
The first accommodation was a rustic dwelling with 6 short beds in one room, foam matresses and no running water. Wine was sold here. The lunch was spam and dehydrated potatoes. Never mind, the location was tops! The building was located right on Laguna Colorado which is a big lake with extroadinary blood red coloured waters. The bizarre red colour is due to the natural pigments of the algae that live in its shallow, mineral laden waters.
The ones who didn't make it
The algae is also a rich source of food for flamingoes of which we saw many. The flamingoes were a real treat because i have always dreamed of seeing one and find them completely exotic. The birds were feeding most of the time but would walk - stalk around, pose on one leg and make little noises. They really are very pink, especially on the tail feathers and under the wings. There was also salt icebergs in the lake that made for dramatic views most pleasing to the eye. We ate llama steaks for dinner. Llamas are perfect animals for the people of this area, they provide warmth, a food source and carry gear plus they survive at high altitudes on little grasses. We didnīt sleep to well thanks to the freezing desert night, luckily we had the sleeping bags but we are also considering buying up all the Bolivian llama wool gear so we look like true travellers.The second day us two got up very early and braved the bitter cold morning to climb up to a lookout in the hope of capturing on camera some flamingoes lit by the sunset, the sun hid behind the clouds and we missed the shot. Not to worry because we went to many lakes this day and saw a few flamingo colonies. We could have stayed all day and watched their activity but the driver always seemed to press onwards. We did manage to thieve about five pink flamingo feathers including one tail feather. This day also saw us climb to over 4500metres and drive across a high altitude desert of volcanic ash and gravel scattered with rock outcrops that have been sand blasted into surreal shapes by the constant howling winds.
Border
The strangest of these was the Arbol de Piedra - means stone tree, a massive boulder eight metres high that balances on a narrow stem. Even the hardy Andean grasses struggle to survive in the harsh desert environment here. Again, we could have had longer here to explore all the rocks. On this day a military guy in a fancy jacket pulled our 4WD over and gave the driver no choice but to take a passenger in our already full vehicle and drive him to for about half an hour, sketchy business. The second night we stayed at a salt hotel where most of the interior was made from salt. It was a bit of a novelty with salt tables and chairs and even chandeliers, you just had to give it a lick to make sure it was real.This morning we were up at 4am to the dismay of the Irish lads. We set out hooning flat out in the dark across the salt flats towards Inca Wasi, a small island marooned in the centre of the lifeless desert of salt. The salt lake is the largest in the world and although there is water below the surface of the lake, there is a thick, hard upper crust of salt that is easily capable of supporting the weight of a car. The surface is perfectly flat and the salt surface shines with an intense whiteness. The driver and cook lost their way in the dark a couple of times and stopped the vehicle until they could locate a landmark amongst the chains of snow capped mountains lining the far horizon. We are glad they found the way because the salt flats are 9000square kilometres large and it was bloody well freezing.
Bolivian flag
The sheer immensity and strangeness of the landscape make it breathtaking and so does the altitude at 3653m.We reached the top of the Inca Wasi island in time to watch the sun wake up and we were rewarded with stunning views and delicious colours. These views across the immense white expanse of the salar were of silhouettes of the snowcapped mountains and an extinct volcano on the horizon which then gave way to pastel lilacs and fairy floss pinks painted by the sun. You had the feeling that you were on an island surrounded by water, not salt and 4WDs are the transport, not boats. We were the only ones at the top this morning, other tours choosing to sleep in snugged in their beds. The early bird wins! The island also manages to support an extremely tenacious ecosystem. The entire surface is covered with giant cartoon like cacti, some of which are more than ten metres tall and thought to be hundreds of years old. The trunks of the cacti are the only locally available source of wood and we saw their distinctively pockmarked timber in doors and roofs in villages. There was a strange shrine on top of the island that had offerings of cigarettes, coins and coca leaves, i think these were left by people trying to appease Pachamama, the gods of Mother Earth.
We had breakfast at the base of the island and were soon joined by the other 4WDs. The salt flats are the perfect place to do photo shoots where you can take images that trick the eyes perception, making objects and people appear larger or smaller, closer or further away from the camera lens.
English lads
We had a few corker shots where we made objects like our passports, monoloco monkey, a Miffy the Rabbit keyring and sunglasses appear larger and us people, appear smaller. We took shots where it seemed like Nadia was holding a shrunken me in the palm of her hand, where it looked like we were standing on a giant cube or shoe or stomping on or eating each other. The best photograph was of all of us appearing like we were entering a giant Pringles chips tube........classic.The journey ended in Uyuni, Bolivia where we ate a horrendous lunch and tipped the driver a very small amount. There were rumours that the drivers only get paid about US$25 for the three days work. In Uyuni we visited the museum where there was a random selection of ancient artifacts from the region. There were some bones from a giant bear like dinosaur creature, flints, bows and arrows, musical instruments, combs, spoons, deformed skulls where the cranium had been reshaped from birth, a mummified baby feutus who was buried with some objects for the after life and three other mummies complete with gory remains of hair portions, toenails, teeth, skin and clothing scraps and some leather shoes that were 1400 years old. Just after i took an illagal photo of the mummies, the lights flickered on and off, eery.
We visited a salt processing village called Colchani where we saw locals extracting salt and scraping it off the ground into small mounds. The salt is then carted off on bicycles or in wheelbarrows or trucks for processing. The salt mounds look like giant piles of cocaine but we were assured they werent. Communities like the one here used to use the salt as a resource to exchange for maize and coca leaves from other indigenous communities. Every year dozens of pack llamas would set off in caravans to make the exchanges. These days this is done by truck. There were some classic souvenir shacks selling ashtrays, baby llama figurines and dice carved entirely by salt by the villagers. They also had a wacky museum entrabce fee one boliviano where the star attractions were two dried up stuffed armadillos and a giant larger than life llama statue made from salt that we had fun riding on.
Bolivia is back to the indigenous people and rustic living that we love. The women mostly wear their traditional dress that includes thick skirt, thick stockings or leg warmers, apron, blouse, braided hair, trilby type hat sitting high on the head and most times there is also that little lump on their back which is usually a baby wrapped in brightly coloured woven fabric. Siesta is very much happening here too. Evertything in town stops (including school) at about 1pm till 4pm and then wakes up again.
Uyuni much more pleasant than most people would say. Dinner of hot chips, tomato sauce and sausages cost $1.60 between us (13 Bolivianos). Our private room for the night was $3.30 each. We leave to Potosi tomorrow morning instead of the graveyard run available tonight.
