Salar de Uyuni Day 3

Tuesday 10 May
We leave a fraction after 6 a.m. The boys got the wood-fuelled fire going pretty quickly with me holding a torch and giving them the cardboard roll from the toilet paper which seemed to do the trick to get the yareta going. Yummy soft fluffy pancakes and something like nutella with black tea for breakfast. It is dark and minus 3 deg C. Muy frio (very cold)! There is snow on the road.

A couple of vehicles had already left, going to the Chilean border which is only open between 9 - 10 a.m.

It's surreal driving through the dark on dirt roads strewn with fallen boulders. As dawn lights up the sky, huge snow-capped mountains become clearer - we are at over 4800 m. Mt. Apacheda looms up front; there is a borax processing plant behind it which is powered geo-thermally from the nearby geyser area which we are on the way to visit.

Just before the geyser area we stop at a geo-thermal well drilled by an electricity company in the preliminary stages of its feasibility study (mind you, in the National Park ...); we used the steam to clean our shoes!

After viewing the gurgling, bubbling geyser Sol de Mañana, issuing huge plumes of steam (fumaroles) - our shoes once again dirty - we make our way to the natural thermal water of the hot springs (Termas de Polques). As we approach, we brace ourselves for a dip! We've been psyching ourselves for days as to whether or not we'd brave the cold to do this.

Can't believe we did it! Freezing out - and then we 'plunge' (= dip in ladylike) into the 38 deg C hot pool with lovely soft pebbly bottom, soaking up the heat and looking out onto the beautiful colours on the surrounding hills. Amazing. We counted 1, 2, 3 and clambered (probably unladylike) out of the pool and raced to the shelter. Teeth chattering, we towelled off with our tiny microfibre squares and dived into our clothes - 9 a.m. and we were all done!

The next bit of territory channelled Salvador Dali: strangely-shaped rocks in a lunar-like landscape and brilliantly coloured mountains with snow in the background.

On the border is the Licancabur Volcano; at the foot of this is the Laguna Verde (Green Lagoon) which we feared would be frozen over but in fact it was definitely an emerald green (due to magnesium, copper and arsenic - so therefore poisonous!); we are at 4350 m. We see the Laguna Blanca (White Lagoon) on the way through.

On the way back to Uyuni we get our national park tickets checked at a different control point. Just beyond here is a large lagoon that used to have water but it has evaporated leaving behind large deposits of borax which are extracted here and taken by truck to the processing plant.

More 4-wheel driving through rocky sand dune country: down through a canyon with small streams, some pools of water - some frozen - and clumps of yellow grasses interspersed with small green bushes (thola); llamas grazing. We are descending off the altiplano.

We passed through Malku Villa Mar, a very large village.

We had lunch at the Valley of the Rocks and the very pretty Black Lagoon (Laguna Negra) with its totora reeds and perimeter of beautifully shaped red rocks. It has turned out to be more attractive than its better-known counterparts, the Red, White and Green Lagoons. We see Andean geese, sola (a coot?) native to this black lagoon and also to a black lagoon in Chile. And we see an emu (suri). [more text below]

After lunch we spend half an hour helping another 4-wheel drive that is bogged; apparently only the back part of the 4-wheel drive is working ... we had already passed earlier another vehicle changing a tyre. These mishaps are very common out here apparently. We have been lucky.

On the way to San Cristóbal we pass through (4-wheel drive style) the Alota River; William makes 2 passes of it to wash the salt off the bottom of the vehicle ...





San Cristóbal was once a farming community but now many of the people there are employed in the silver mine. It is pretty much a company town with the old town relocated and rebuilt when the old one was found on top of silver. This silver mine is the biggest in Bolivia: it has been going for just 4 years. Nice colonial church here.



We get into Uyuni at about 4 p.m. Our plane for La Paz doesn't leave until 8:25 p.m. so we have 'time to kill' (not sure what the rush was?). William and Luis drop us off in town and come back for us at 6 p.m.

There's not much to do in Uyuni. It's just a hub for tourists going out to the salt plains, although we did go and check out the train station which, by Uyuni standards, was quite a decent building - and nice and warm! 

The line goes south to Antofagasta on the border with Chile and to La Paz in the other direction.

We join many other dusty, weary, wind-blown passengers to board the flight to La Paz. A wonderful sight as we fly in - the city lit up like a jewellery box!

We are picked up at the airport at La Paz. It's nice to see Ismael's cheery face again! In by about 10 p.m. - it's been a LONG day! Very tired (muy cansada) and we can't wait to stay in decent lodgings once more!

Joke against each other: when we got in TOP asks me what is the time (a regular question because she doesn't have a watch ...) and we saw on our i-phones that the zone had changed to La Paz which is correct but the time hadn't changed. It took at least an hour for me to comment that we are still in Bolivia (so the time in La Paz is the same as in Uyuni ...). We both chuckled. TOP said 'But it FEELS like another country!' Yep, I had been thinking the same ...