Uyuni - Train Cemetary - Colchani - Salar de Uyuni - Isla Incawasi - San Juan - Galaxia Caves - Chaquiri - Laguna de Canapa - Arbol de Piedra - Laguna Colorada - Solar de Mañana Geysers - Polques Hot Springs - Laguna Verde - Lincacabur Volcano - Laguna Blanca - Valles de Rocas - Queteña Chico - San Antonio - UyuniTwelve tourists and two guides departed Uyuni at around 1030am that morning. The terrorists were mainly from Ireland, a few Polish, some French and a sole Aussie. Our first stop was at the Train Cemetary on the outskirts of town where really old trains had been left to die after the end of the war with Chile. Then we headed to the Salar itself, stopping at a small collection of buildings and people where they produced salt bricks and sold souvenirs - very exciting!! Nahhht. I acutally wasn`t too impressed by the salf flat itself either - who gives a shit about a giant salty plain? Obvously a lot of people. We stopped at a spring briefly before arriving at the only salt hotel left on the Salar itself where the toilet was 5 bob (10 times more expensive than some in La Paz) and just too go inside you had to buy something - heh heh. It was very intersting seeing a building made entirely of salt though. The others did the obligatory perspective photos - I participated somewhat reluctantly not really intersted but it was a harmless enough bit of fun. Lunch was surprisingly good - surprisingly good food continued to be a theme for the rest of the tour. It did lack salt though - I made up for my sodium deficiency that day by at random bending down and chicken pecking at detritus on the ground.
Next stop was Incahuasi Island, a small island in the salt covered in phallic cactii up to 1200 years old - they grow at 1cm a year. They were amazing in shape and colour and along with coral relics from its time as an ocean floor and the incredible surroundings made for a completely surreal and unforgettable experience.
We then headed on to San Juan and the company`s own Salt Hotel - a beautiful circular-designed structure of course constructed completely of salt bricks. I have been told of the differing effects of negative and positive ions in the past - negatives are present in the ocean due to itself vast quantities of sodium and are reported to provide a cleansing and mood-improving effect. I wondered if being in a salt hotel might generate similar. It may possibly have been the negative ions or something else that inspired Martin the birthday boy to lick, sip and suck Tequila-style, using the wall of the building for salt. Earlier the Irish girls Sheena, Anne-Marie, Ruth, the Poles and myself had explored our surroundings for sunset and created some highest-desert-in-the-world time-lapse photo madness :)
We all slept very well - except perhaps for the guides and driver. The driver for another group on their return to Uyuni that day was still smashed off his face, hardly able to function and the group was forced to wait at least 5 hours longer than expected to leave that morning. Our guys weren`t quite that bad but were still drunk. Kataryna made the comment that they were like young teenagers - I agreed and thought this could also be applied to the mentality of a lot of Bolivians.
Our first stop that day was at the Galaxia Caves, one with exquisite coral and algae shapes and the other with mummified 1200AD remains. Leaving the Salar we then journeyed into brown pastel mountains and desert flats to find bizarre brown coral shapes. In a way I was seriously regretting not having brought some San Pedro along with me, but the constant car travel would not have been good. Then was a wave-like lava flow of smoothed red rock, shaped by eons of consistent wind. We circumnavigated Chaquiri Volcano (between 5500-6000m high) and past by the military town of Chaquiri with its Star Wars-like road-tyre domes.
We took lunch at incredible Lake Canapa which was full of freekin flamingoes. Three types of similar-looking flamigoes inhabit this area of the world - Andean, Chilean and the James. The shallow lake sat in a basin of snow-tinged black mountains next to another bright salt flat. Absolutely beautiful. Bert`s tour was also here - we crossed paths several times during the 3 day tour, exchanging stories and trip notes and exciting things.
Our afternoon took us down a long, deep valley of greeny-brown mountain and past a series of shallow lakes of varying colours like brown and grey-green. The next stop was at the Arbol de Piedra, or Stone Tree. Actually it was many Stone Trees, or better a series of rocks eroded into incredibly trippy shapes in the middle of the desert. To describe them with words wouldn`t serve to much, so I won`t. Just look at the photos why don`t ya¿
The young brash driver of the other vehicle had been smashing it for the past few days and as such their wheel came off and rolled in a cloud of dusted for 100m or so... to rather comic effect for us. Everyone was OK, as was the axle and the whole car`s worth of people managed to find all the wheel nuts to repair and continue within an hour - quite impressive. The whole thing¿ - very Bolivian. I was glad our soft-spoken driver was also softly-driven.
We finally arrive at the Lake Colorada lookout... for a grand total of 10 minutes! I went down to the Lake proper to at least get some feeling for it and upon return get hurried up by the impatient driver! $%&$· deadshits. It was incredible though, flamingoes dotting a multi-coloured shimmering lake with edible-looking yellow-brown mudcakes underneath the obligatory sentinel mountain. Then to the Eduardo Avaroa Fauna Reserve, with a modest ;) entry fee of 150 Bob - the 2nd most expensive park entry fee (after Machu Pichu) in the poorest country in South America. Our accomodation that evening was certainly a step down from the salt hotel but passable. We communicated, consumed and consumated our love in a round of time-lapsody.
It was very, very cold that night. -15 was the word, actually. I still managed to get in a round of exercise and early-morning photography before another ultra-coffeee breakfast and hitting the road. Our first stop was the Solar de Mañana Geysers, steaming and bubbling away with crazy colours and smells. Very cool. Then to the best hot springs of South America (and that`s saying a lot) right on the shore of Colorada at Polques. Just divine, nothing more to say.
Unfortunately after those two grand experiences the day was very rushed. In total I spent 11 hours in the car until Uyuni, much of it driving hurriedly with a few rushed breaks. We passed through the `Salvador Dali` area, where impossible stones just appeared out of the desert under incredibly beautiful and subtle mountains of pastel hues. Astonishing. The otherworldlyness continued down through another valley to Lake Verde, coloured emerald green by its high heavy metal content - arsenic, copper, lead and sulphur. Above towered the impressive pyramid volcano of Lincacabur. Five minutes later we were in Chile (mas o menos) - the Irish left me with promises of a Melbourne reunion and Martin, Kataryna and I said our goodbyes also. Thanks guys, it was very fun hanging out with the San Pedro Dick Team - muchly appreciated all your good vibes :)!
So with just me in the car I quickly got the impression that Huaskar (our excellent guide) and German (the driver) had logged off for the day and seemed only intent on getting back to Uyuni - but once I found out how far the journey was on rough dirt roads I understood their intentions. The music was well and truly in the hands of the Bolivians up front - I counted my lucky ones that I`d brought my noise-blocking headphones to block out the UTTER $/%/$· SHITE pop/reggaton that I`d heard at least 74 billion times before.
We journeyed through more long and wide valley landscapes with salted-white valley floors and snow-dusted-white mountaintops. Despite my discomfort being so long in the car the my surreal surroundings were definitely not lost on me - this day was in its own way just as spectacular as the previous.
For lunch we stopped at a gorgeous creek carved a few metres down into the landscape where ice slowly melted with the day and Andean geese pfaffed aboot. We stopped briefly so German could visit his family in Queteña Chico, then passed through several Valles de Rocas on our way back to Uyuni. These seemed to me to be massive lava flows in trippy eroded patterns that somehow formed mini-clifflines of about 4m high in the middle of nowhere. An armadillo ran across the road at one point. After stopping at San Antonio for a bite I finally arrived back at Uyuni, thanked Huaskar and German and headed for my hostel a little bit dazzled by the beauty of it all.
And so ended my journey through the land of supernatural art - an exposition of sculptures, carvings, paintings and textiles from some incredible alien artists using natural materials on the grandest scale possible... want to go?
No comments:
Post a Comment