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None of us could believe it when after waiting for nearly 2 hours at the rather dodgy boarder to leave Chile we arrived at a shack in the middle of the dessert and were all asked (demanded) for our passports! Welcome to Bolivia! After we'd all checked through the shack we pilled into our 4x4's with our Bolivian drivers who spoke not a word of English and headed for the salt flats! After a rocky start with the driver we made amends and soon had some local folk music blaring out as we headed to see the first of the lakes and sights of Bolivia. It was an amazing first day as we spotted pink flamingos, gysers and lamas galore! We arrived at our home for the night and all grabbed as many blankets as we could carry-it was bloody freezing, well we were at 4700m! After tucking into a suprisingly good dinner and many a game of Black Shmack and 'would you rather' we all decided it was time for bed, so fully clothed with so many blankets we could hardly move we hit the sack.
Unfortunately the next morning was a slow one as the altitude took its tole, we all awoke with heads that felt like they were about to explode and Rich's belly was having none of it, so after abit of a rocky start the guide had Rich chewing on some local 'coca' leaves that are apparently supposed to help with altitude sickness,looking at his face you would of though it was making it twice as bad but he was soon back on track (Unfortunately for Charlie and a couple of the boys it was not quite so simple and their belly problems were going to stick with them for a while!!!) Next stop on our trip was Salvadors Rock which is a beautiful rock tree right in the middle of the dessert-very bizzare, then it was on to see the wind rocks and green blue and god knows what other colour lakes! After some lunch looking over blue lake with flamingos galore we then headed to what was meant to be our night in a salt hotel...unfortunately as we were currently in wet season and wet it was up in the salt flats so instead we all pilled into a little hostel in the most remote town we'd ever seen and it wasnt long before the guys had been challenged to a game of football with the locals. The guys were doing really well but as we were still at 4000m the locals had a definite altitude advantage as they ran about with ease....the boys on the other had were blowing! They didnt let us down though as they won 10-9...even with the locals adding on a few extra mins in the hope the boys might keel over! After dinner and abit too much wine and beer we all headed to bed in readiness for the salt flats the next morning.
We woke up to an amazing sunny day and all chucked our bags on top of the truck and headed for the flats, as it happend one of the local ladies needed a lift to the nearest town an hour away and due to a distinct lack of buses or any other form of transport for that matter it wasnt long before she was sat in the front seat bowler hat, plats down to her bum and all! After we'd dropped off our hitchhiker we all ditched the bags and climbed on top of the truck all sat in the luggage rack feet dangling over the edge...we then looked out to the most ridiculous sight. The salt flats were all flooded by a couple of inches of crystal clear water so it was impossible to see where the sky ended and the flats began, it was like looking at a land of nothingness for as wide as the eye could see. Soon we were whizzing across the flats ontop of our 4x4's waving at each other from one truck to another....it was the most amazing feeling as the sun shone down on us while we were in what seemed to be a whole other world! After half an hour we all jumped off at a salt hotel for lunch, it was so crazy literally everthing was made of salt, chairs, tables, beds, everything! So after licking the wall just to check, we gobbled down our lunch and headed outside for some obligitory photos of T-Rex eating us and richard holding us up with one hand! After playing for as long as possible in the weird land we all clambered ontop of the trucks, white head to toe from all the dried salt and set out for Uyuni, the bigggest town in the area.
Sadly we arrived at Uyuni and tried to check into any hostel that would have us for a well needed shower, it had been 3 days(5 for Charlie who had been to tempted by black shmack rather than a shower, not a wise move)! None of us could believe when we were told that the town had had no water for 4 days and that they now also had a power cut....no showers for sweaty white us, and nearly full toilets for our delight too! We decided to cut our losses and all headed out for pizza and copious amounts of wine and beer, excellent choice!
It was here that we picked up our ninth traveller Dave and all 9 of us (Margo,James,Adam,Charlie,Lauren,Rose,Dave and us) headed for Potosi!
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JoJo Ah Shelly, have been catching up on all your blogs for everywhere you have been!!! It ALL sounds so amazing, bet you just dont want to come back....ever. Your piccies have been fab on FB too. Keep enjoying you dream trip and we must catch up when you get back to dreary old england. xxx