Blog post 4 - San Pedro to Uyuni
We had a good day acclimatising in San Pedro, sorting out the food at the local supermarket and finalising our tour.
Our accommodation at San Pedro was in a glamping type of tent which was a new experience.
Our tour started early on the 4th as we were picked up in a van at the hostel to join 3 other, two American although he was French but bought up in the UK, and a chap from Ireland. They were all less than half our age but it was great. The French American spoke quite good Spanish which was a god send as our driver/guide only spoke Spanish.
The tour started with a drive to the Bolivian border at 4,000m where we had breakfast in the rising sun. Man it was cold. We had lots of layers on. Then we changed vehicles and headed off in a big 4WD Lexus for 3 days on unsealed roads. The area is dotted with old volcanoes which makes for a pretty interesting landscape.
The tour took us through the Eduardo Avaroa Andean Fauna national park with the first stop at the White Lagoon which was covered in ice, thus the name, at the base of the Lincanabur Volcano. Next was the green Lagoon, then the Salvador Dali desert so named because the rocks on the sandy hills reminds one of the famous painter. Then it was on to soak in a hot pool at the Polque hot springs whilst our guide made us lunch.
Then on the the Sol de la Manana Geyser feild where the very cold wind got up that made the geysers a lot less spectacular. It was still a very clear blue sky day. Then on to the Red Lagoon, made red by the Alger. It is home to about 30,000 pink flamingos so they say but a quite a few must have been on holiday elsewhere.
Back in their 4WD it was off to our accomodation at Villa Mar. Basic but clean but very cold. Had dinner and off to bed. The not so hot shower dribbled from the rose but it did wash off some of the dust. Dinner wasn’t great with warm soup, cold spaghetti and bolonais sauce but it filled the tummy.
Day two we visited a couple of interesting rock formations, a deep canyon which I don’t know how they form as there is so little rainfall. The area is basically a desert dotted with a few species of very hardy plants.
From there to the Sora wetlands where we saw lots of llamas and vicunas.
Then on to our accomodation at a hotel built largely of blocks of salt. The hotel was owned by the tour company and was a considerable improvement on the previous night. Height 3,600m.
Next morning it was up early, 5am, to get to the Uyuni Salt Flats (3,660m) to watch the sun rise. It wasn’t that spectacular as there was a bit of cloud on the horizon but still a great place to be. The salt flats are just enormous 120 km by 120 km or about 15,000 square kilometres.
We had breakfast at a table and stools made of salt blocks at the base of an island in the salt flats that is covered in very large cacti. From the top of the island, I don’t think you can see the far edges of the salt flats as they are over the horizon. Quite amazing.
A short drive from there to Uyuni for the night where we left the tour. A dusty town seemingly only there for the tourists today. It use to be a major train station were salt and other minerals were freighted out of the area. The old train cemetery was interesting. There was hardly any rust in well over 100 years.
The life of those who live here must be really hard. The poverty is extreme. The area is largely a dust bowl with hardly a plant of any kind in site except for the very hardy ones in the desert. The infrastructure is old and random unless you play football. Every town seems to have a new very green artificial turf.
Gaye is looking forward to finding some vegetables but fruit is common.
Off to Potosi next
Got my old "National Geographic Atlas of the World" out (old school!) and have tried to find most of the places so far. I won't tell you that we are having the most glorious spell of weather, even if the ABs lost this morning! Thanks for you updates!
ReplyDelete