Salar de Uyuni

Salt!
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We arrived in Uyuni, a remote town on the edge of the Salar de Uyuni, the worlds largest salt flats.  The bus journey took 6 hours, but the whole ride was through amazing landscape so we easily passed the time gazing out of the window... a welcome distraction from the uncomfortable ride.  We were sat right at the back, dust billowed in through the open windows and the person in front of me reclined his seat so far his headrest was about a foot from my nose.  Luckily there was no need for an emergency stop! Not forgetting to mention that there was a lamb on board too.

Salar de Uyuni
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Quickly found a hostel on the edge of town; the end of our road just disappeared into the horizon.  Had a great pizza and a few beers in one restaurant full of travellers.  Uyuni has over 60 tour operators who lead trips into the Salar, some choice, so the following day we headed in to a independent tourist office that has comprehensive traveller reports on their experiences of trips with the different companies.  After a wee look at the database and a flick through some of the reports we quickly chose Empexsa Tours, headed there and booked for a 3 day trip.  There are numerous reports of 4WD in poor condition, drivers drinking on the trip, poor accommodation and poor food.  What quickly became apparent is that the driver was the one who seemed most likely to make or break a trip.  We were lucky too in that our driver, Rudi, had glowing reports from his trips.

Isla de Pescadora
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The trip started at the civilised hour of 10.30am.  Our group consisted of a French couple, a Bolivian, an Italian and us plus our driver, Rudi. Common language = Spanish so lots of practice for Ivan and I.  Luckily Rudi spoke slowly so we were able to understand a lot even if our conversation was a bit limited.  The first stop was the Cementerio de Ferrocarriles, the train cemetery, the resting place of huge rusting steam trains. Then onto Colchani, a tiny town devoted to salt processing in a small scale, unmechanised way. Finally we drove onto the thick crusted salt, a bit grubby to start with but it soon became a stark white.  The salt is 3m thick and walking on it was crispy and crunchy.  We had a brief stop at a salt hotel, made from blocks of salt and then continued driving across the huge expanse of white.  Next stop was Inca Huasi, a cacti covered island in the middle of the salar, great views all around and an opportunity to take a few unusual photos!  It is hard to capture the salt landscape in words or pictures as it is so vast but it is a magical place and we found ourselves smiling broadly at how gorgeous it is.  The salt lake is all you can see for miles other than the surrounding volcanoes but finally it came to an end and we drove off onto a rough track. This took us to the site of the Cuve del Diablo, the devil's cave, an intricate cave that looked akin to a mass of spider's webs covered in layers of dust, very lace like in appearance and stunning.  There was also a good mirador of the salar and the cave of the chullpas, the skeletal remains of pre-inca people.  The final drive for the day took us to our lodgings, basic but comfortable.  Dinner was by candlelight as the generator providing the electricity stopped early into the evening.

Sarah messing around on a giant Pan Pipes!
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The next day our first stop was an area of coral formations, in the middle of a semi desert.  Then onto some red rock formations overlooked by a semi active volcano, with visible smoking fissures and rivers of yellow sulpher.  Finally the 4WD had it's work cut out as as we headed off road onto a rough rocky uphill track to a lake of vivd blue and tens of pink flamingoes.  Then another lake of flamingoes, including  rare James flamingoes, with their black tail feathers. After lunch we drove through brown desert, spotting ostriches running in the opposite direction, onto the area with the Arbol de piedra, a stone shaped like a tree, from the wind and sand erosion.  Final stop of the day was the Lago Colorada, a bright red lake, again with hundreds if not thousands of flamingoes.  After the second night's accommodation, electricity but no running water, we were up at 4.30am to catch sunrise at the geyser's, which was an incredible sight, there were also large numbers of bubbling mud pools and water. We stopped for breakfast at another lake and Ivan took a dip in the hot thermal baths on the edge. The final site before our crossing to Chile was the Laguna Verde, a bright green lake, the green from the mineral deposits in the area. It was an amazing three days and one of the highlights of the trip so far.