After the ruddy drama of getting to Bolivia the Salt Flats or Salar de Uyuni was the bad boy we had been waiting and wanting to see. Tired after our 12 hour overnight bus ride from La Paz we waited bleary eyed for the jeep to pick us and two other couples up for our three days, two night tour of this natural wonder of the world.
The first stop was a sad little train cemetery out on the desert where we could act like big kids climbing on the government abandoned graffiti scrawled locomotives. I don’t really know why this was included in the tour as it wasn’t the best landmark I have ever visited but was so random it was fun!
After a short break in a tiny village where they showed us the process from collecting the salt to packaging it up into bags of salt you can get from the local supermarket it was time to get out into the sticks and get onto the salt lake. The worlds largest salt flats, formed by transformed prehistoric lakes, make you feel like you are on another planet. Everywhere you look is blinding white and just vast space filled with blue sky.
Of course the silly optical illusion photos were mandatory but don’t be fooled by its soft snow-like appearance as sitting on the crusty salt was quite painful on the old derriere. You couldn’t take your sunglasses off as it was so super bright and quite warm but with a biting breeze hence the random assortment of layers and hats!
Then it was onto Cactus Island. A jagged spiky place of humungous cacti just plonked in the middle of all this salt, apparently animals can’t survive in this primitive conditions not even insects but these hard fast cacti, the oldest being here for 900 years, have stood the test of time. We had a quick hike around and headed to our room for the night…. In a salt hotel.
Yep everything from the floor, walls, tables, chairs and bed frames are made of blocks of solid salt. For research purposes I had to check it was true! I can now add this place along with the floating reed hut to my list of the weirdest places I have slept in.
Coming tomorrow part 2 in our Salt Flats adventure (including advice if you are planning on doing this trip)….
