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Chile to Bolivia: San Pedro to Uyuni
The tour from San Pedro de Atacama in Chile to Uyuni, Bolivia was a three day, two night affair in a four wheel drive through the most incredible and alien landscapes; achingly desolate desert, thermal rivers simmering in icey winds, gangly pink flamingoes, munching llamas, peppermint green and orange fields littered with frozen puddles, exploding misty geizers, an empty salt lake that goes for miles in perfect white, island hills carpeted in 20 meter cacti, a graveyeard of trains, and an old mining town that is slowing dying of poverty since the mine closed and all European wealth evaporated with it.
Ella: San Pedro de Atacama's desert streets are as regularly swept with roaring dust tornados as they are with swarms of tourists bedecked in swirling tye-dyed thai fisherman pants, matty dreads and Peter Pan style hats proclaiming their desire to never grow up. This irritating variety of traveler looks wearyingly down their pierced noses at the pathetic hoards of tourists around them (including us), refusing to visit rediculous touristy sites or take part in any such cliched activity because they are not a tourist. Instead these ‘free spirits’ ‘go with the flow’ to experience the ‘real’ South America from behind a chain of cigarettes and a glass of fragrant mulled wine, preaching sex as the food of life to any passing women and making colourful woven bracelets to sell to the actual tourists. San Pedro’s streets are overflowing with such individuals, whose rainbow attire screamed tourist so loudly I wanted to block my ears and run.
Phil: Sickness yet again got the better of me in dusty, deserty old San Pedro. This time it was a nasty combination of diarrhea and altitude sickness which culminates in all over body aches, headaches, weakness and you know what. To make matters worse we were lodging in a party hostel: Upon arrival I spoke 3 wobbly words in Spanish to a group of above style revelers, had a mind blank, said “ciau” and walked away mid introductions. Sickness does strange things to people. Fortunately this dusty hostel (the cleaners poured buckets of water on the lounge floor to keep the dirt down) also proffered up two lovely English cousins who are now full-fledged friends of ours.
Bouyed by the varying Lonely Planet descriptions “a dreamy and extreme 3-day jeep journey” and “bring something for the thumping headaches” it was time to become a real tourist. The sort that pays a large fee and sits back to enjoy the bumpy ride. We chose Colque Tours for our trip to Bolivia and did exactly that.
Out of a group of 10 we ended up in the same jeep as the other English Speakers. Convenient. There was an Aussie with an English accent (a recent immigrant), a crack-up Irish woman and her amusing English para-trooper partner who was scared of most things, including heights! Luckily for him our local driver, tour guide Hanoch didn’t drink (like most if guide books are to be trusted), and drove at a steady pace.
'Bolivia Migracion' felt like the middle of nowhere – when stealing Bolivia’s land in the late 1800s the Chilean’s must have reached this place and thought that’ll do. In these desolate wind-beaten surroundings (we came across an old bus reduced to a shell of its former self) we experienced the biting cold of the high Altiplano. This extreme freeze and raging wind often kept us tucked snugly in our four wheel drive despite the glorious landscapes. Winding down reluctant windows cameras were thrust into the ferocious cold to capture a quickly evolving and phenomenal landscape: Red-tinged mountains, turquoise lagoons, wild rock formations and geysers “clouded” in mystery. Now you see your fellow tourist, now you don’t. A woman once fell in apparently.
We passed through tiny mudbrick towns where children, puffed round with wool, ran in dusty streaks through the streets. Women sitting high on hilltops and perched astride mountainous skirts sifted mounds of drying quinoa, its red dust filling the air with a pink haze. We spent slightly hysterical nights with stabbing headaches screaming in our ears on beds atop concrete slabs covered with velveteen bedspreads showing smiling deer families in snowy mountain settings. We were told hilarious stories of about aging Irish nuns Sister Rose and Sister Eugenius and giggled our way into a stiff, achy sleep.
Alarmingly, during the first day of the tour Hanoch revealed his unfortunate love for the horrors of Spanish pop-trance-dance music. We wearily listened to continuously repeated CDs rolling over such classics as Spanish language Basehunter. At first listen there was an underlying humour at the hideousness of such music and the very fact that it had come into existence at all. By second listen it was almost comforting in its repeated homeliness. By third to millonth listen our eyes were watering as our ears slowly died to Basehunters Spanish whine. Thundering over the CD was a DJs voice that epitomised Disney evil as it laughed manically and announced with slimy relish ´f*** you! Cochabamba, Bolivia! Bahahahahar.´ His penetrating voice seemed to become the audio version of a fat hairy man licking the inside of your ear. However, despite our subtle hints and attempts to change the music to anything, anything else our guide was pleased with his selection and continued to return to it throughout our three day, 72 hour venture.
Ella: Like nervous preteens smoking virgin cigarettes behind school bike sheds we tested our first coca leaves. Giggling we exclaimed wildly when tongues went numb or imagined whisperings of euphoria ensued. We breathed deep with the knowledge the ancient practice would help fill our lungs once more. And by we I mean they. I only went as far as the coca lolly, a small green montrosity which leaked its horrible juices into an unforgetable ickyness on my tongue. After exclaiming with faux heartiness that it would make a delicious tea, I carefully wrapped up the sticky lolly remains and placed them in my pocket for some later time which would never exist. The bountiful bag of dry leaves brought for the tinyest sum would slowly fill our bag and belongings with its thick tea-ey smell. Coca is now an inescapable sensory element of our Bolivian experience.
Phil: This trip had 3 highlights. Stripping down to my man-shorts in sub-zero temperatures to frolic in a natural Altiplano hot spring, by myself; Those fits of laughter while sharing a freezing dorm with our new best friends – the beds came complete with dangerously slippery satin sheets and; Meeting a bunch of kids in chemistry coat uniforms in a tiny town hundreds of miles from anywhere.
Despite snotty noses and their isolated surroundings the kids all had giant smiles. When our two 4-wheel-drives packed to the gunnels with Gringos arrived they came running. It was as if Michael Jackson had risen from the dead and come to visit. When we offered peanuts they eagerly accepted but instead of holding out their hands they lifted the hem of their sweatshirts in preparation for a massive haul.
In front of our eager cameras they had a stage to perform daring, death defying poses. We also climbed the water tower together and met their pet llamas until it was time to leave. More so than ticking off the big tourist hotspots or famous landmarks, its moments like these that make a trip special and we’ll never forget those kids. Next time we visit it will be with a trailer full of peanuts, soccer balls and digital cameras.
At the famous sala de lago itself we ate BBQ-ed Llama on an island whose name wistfully recalled ghostly days of waves and ocean bounty, La Isla del Pescado (The Island of the Fish). The island was carperted with 20m tall cactus whose pock marked bodies told the tales of hundreds of years, reaching their prickled arms into a flawlessly blue sky. We were reminded of a ski field gone desert as the flat salty expanse crawled with excited wintery tourists in matching colourful alapaca hats and wooly jumpers featuring thousands of llamas on parade.
When at last in Uyuni we found ourselves in a town lost in the middle of harsh desert emptiness, surrounded with a vast plastic bag sea that crept forever outwards into the nothingness. At night happy dogs prowled piles of rubbish that climbed high up street lamps and rolled with the wind through the streets. We ate a $B12 ($2.50) meal of llama ribs served by a couple of young Bolivian girls and their smiling little brothers. As we battled with the chewy meat we were watched over by a tiny stuffed armadillo who brought luck to the house. Hopefully it will watch over us in the rest of Bolivia.
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