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Dan and Claire go worldwide
So we survived another Bolivian bus journey after a terrible nights sleep along the most bumpy road we have ever had the pleasure of travlling on (only 5% of Bolivia's roads are actually paved!!). We arrived early morning in Uyuni, the starting place of our much anticipated 3 day tour of the natural wonders of Southwest Bolivia. We headed off in our 4x4 jeep with 4 other travellers, and Lorenzo the driver along with his wife the Cook and toddler Diago, who is the cutest and most lovely kid you could ever meet.
its worth mentioning at this point the company, diverse as it was, is worth a mention as we were to be blessed with such presence for three days and nights.the american was there, corey, who turned quickly into a good mate, along with irish cormack, who we ended up travelling for an extended time with-mad guy, our first drug smuggler, and of course as fellow travellers will acknowledge, the two token crazy trouser wearing, big hair, slightly annoying but nice, israeli guys!!
oh yeah, irish can snore!!!
Our first stop was the old train cemetry, which the boys had fun climbing on (as boys do!!). The best was by far yet to come though!! Our next stop of the day was the absolutely stunning Salar de Uyuni, basically HUGE salt lakes that go on for hundreds of miles, as far as the eye can see. They are like pure crystal white deserts of salt, with some patches of salt lakes which are so shallow that you can drive through, all surrounded by snow capped mountains and volcanoes....it was so amazing that i dont think you can compehend unless you see it with your own eyes. The pictures are great, but not a patch on the real thing! In awe, we headed through the salt deserts to an island in the middle of it full of cactus plants! we trekked up the hill to the top for a panoramic view before being pricked one to many times and headed down! In the afternoon we continued across the
salt flats admiring the views on our stop offs along the way. After an amazing day, we headed for our hostel (if you can call it that, more of a shack) although we couldnt complain as it was literally in the middle of nowhere as you can imagine!
The next day we headed for the live volcano, which we didnt attempt to drive up, but instead sat at the bottom and saw the plumes of smoke coming up from inside it! Was good enough for me! From here, we headed to the sand deserts where we saw and climbed some huge, amazing natural rock formations grouped together in the middle of nowhere. very strange, but very cool! Our final stop of the day was the much talked about Lake Colorado, basically a natural blood red lake full of thousands of Flamingoes...and we were not disappointed! It was so beautiful, and very surreal, not the sort of thing you see too often, especially as its all natural. The water isnt actually red, but the chemicals in it make it appear as so in the sunlight. Our hostel for the night was right next to this, although by now we were at very high altitude so it was bitterly cold in the minus degrees! wrapped up in about 4 layers of clothing and 8 wool blankets we headed to bed for a very early start the next morning!!
At 4.30am we rose and drove to the sight of the Geysers, 200 degree plumes of smoke pumping from the middle of the earth through holes in the ground, and watched the sunrise over the mountains, which was so beautiful. In the bitter cold we headed for our breakfast stop, about 5000 km up, where there was a natural hot thermal spring calling our names!! At 7am, we stripped in the freezing cold and made a mad dash for the pool, and had a well deserved soak!! Very surreal as the air was so cold but the water so hot....we had to literally drag ourselves out to go to the next stop! So we headed towards the Chilean border where our trip would end, travelling through the most desolate and naturally beautiful places we have ever seen. Our last stop of the trip was Lake Verde, a huge green lake, although not as stunning as the red one, it was really stunning.
After an unbelievable 3 days, we sadly headed across the border to chile, but not without some amazing memories of the most beautiful places firmly intact. It turned out to be one of the highlights of our travels so far....it was seriously so amazing, that without seeing these things with your own eyes, you just wouldnt understand. Suddenly, all the bad past memories of Bolivia that we had just disappeared.....and the terrifying bus journeys were all worth it just to be here.
xxxxx
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