Helen's Andean Adventure

Salar de Uyuni (contd)

Wednesday

In the morning after having breakfast with the most delicious bread I have ever had (called el pan del pueblo), we were picked up by our tour guide in a 4x4 Toyota SUV and along with a French couple, embarked on our journey to the Salar. On the way there, I finally saw some vicuñas, the third camelid found in Bolivia…they were very different from llamas and alpacas…skinnier and with longer neck. This animal has not been domesticated and lives in the wild, but is protected by the Bolivian government.
The Salar was truly an incredible sight…it looked like a huge white sea or the Arctic…everywhere you looked, there was salt surrounded by mountains. This is the largest salt deposit in the world…it stretches for 12,000 square km…Bolivians export salt to several neighboring countries. It was interesting to learn that only the people from the small town of Colchani, located on one “shore” of Salar have the right to work there…they gather the salt into small piles, transport it back to the town, grind it, add iodine, package it, and ship it out.
Our next stop was Incahuasi (or La Isla del Pescado), a coral-like reef right in the salt field that from far away looks like a giant fish. The most unique thing was that the island was completely covered in giant cacti…we could barely believe our eyes. We walked to the top of the island to enjoy an incredible view of the salar, and then ate a delicious lunch prepared by our guide’s wife right there on the island.
After lunch we went to a very unique cave called Galaxy discovered only 3 years ago by Italian archeologists looking for pre-Incan mummies…the inside was composed of dried-up volcanic ash that took very unusual shapes. The next stop just next door was to the Cementerio de Chulpas (mummy cementery), except that either the indigenous people hid their dead from the Spaniards or the Spaniards stole all the mummies (since people were usually buried with most of their earthly possessions).
Then we headed off to our final destination that day…a small village at the feet of Volcano Tunupa, also located in the salar. Right upon the entrance, we saw another breathtaking sight…flamingos, lots of them, just hanging out at the water puddles in the salar…it was unbelievable to see such an exotic bird, which I always associated with tropical parts of Florida, right there, in the midst of the cold salt field. The next pleasant surprise was seeing lots of llamas at the entrance to our lodgings. The unpleasant surprise that followed was discovering how humble our accommodations were..we barely had a roof and no running water and electricity by generator (mind you, we were in the midst of the cold altiplano). Well, cheered up a little by Meg and Sara, I decided that I could indeed survive one night there, and took advantage of the remaining daylight to try to get close to the llamas and flamingos, both of which I succeeded in doing and got some great pictures. After dinner, we discovered that we only had light till 9pm, but actually weren’t as cold as I imagined when we went to bed in the anticipation of new exciting adventures. (The pictures are of the Salar, the three of us standing on a pile of salt, and flamingos)

posted by HM @ 9:57 PM