08/09/2012 - 11/09/2012 - Un-Bolivia-ble

Two roses (!) between two thorns... Sort of!

Geared up for the big trip - stray dog
in tow!

One of the more impressive border
control buildings...

Time was ticking on, so it was time to head to the third country of the trip. Given the lack of roads between Chile and Bolivia, the tourist route for this journey is generally a three day 4x4 trip across the deserts and mountains. Sign us up! Slightly mixed emotions when we got into our car – we were looking forward to some company but it was just us and our driver, Oscar. He had very little English, although more than our Spanish – was going to be a fun three days! Following a pep talk from some Brazilians finishing their tour over a hearty breakfast, we were off on our way.

Some volcano action

Laguna Blanco

Hot springs, complete with
flamingos in the background!

The stone tree - the fruit was a bit hard!

Mmmm - Geysers. Smelly!

Laguna Rogo

Flamingo time!

First day was filled with lagoon hopping, and our first flamingo encounters. Was also another chance to take a dip in a natural hot spring – no hesitation this time round! Second day we saw the famed stone tree, some more geyser encounters and got to the edge of the Salar de Uyuni for a night in a ‘salt hotel’ – read concrete shell – but given there was a hot shower we weren’t complaining! It was a relief to be there though after a few mechanical issues with the car – who knew hitting the engine repeatedly with a screwdriver would get it running again!

Salt flat fun #1 - a small drink; yes, Tony is under the thumb;
blowing Annaliza over; a monumental jump; and relaxing
in a shady way!

Salt flat fun #2 - in the palm of my hand; crazy crawling;
mind the salt!; would you please shut up;
and trekking boots.

More volcanic action

All snug in a salt hotel

The third day was all about the salt flats – a quick walk around the Cactus Isle preceded a couple of hours attempting hilarity through perspective manipulation in the middle of the flats. Let us know how you think we’ve done – probably all been done before but some of us weren’t lucky enough to come across an ostrich (http://www.ironrik.com/2010/04/giant-ostrich-climbing-anyone.html – once again you outdid us IronRik!). A brief stop at the train cemetery then we were in Uyuni waiting on our next nightbus – 4 hours there was more than enough! Tony’s patience was tested with tales of Annaliza’s exploits in the salt flats 8 years ago – fortunately the timing (different season) combined with Annaliza’s poor memory meant it was a new experience! Tony may regret the promise of going through the 52 rolls of film from that trip – with not even a zoom function on the camera back then the shots are unlikely to be the best!  

Pumping iron in the train cemetary

Key Learnings:

Weird and wonderful
market stalls in Uyuni

1. Hand signals, a phrase book and two way dictionary plus extreme amounts of patience are virtually enough to get through 3 days with someone who knows a limited amount of the mother tongue.  That said we were starting to increase our Spanish knowledge which was a bonus!

2. On a three day trip, the food on the first day is significantly superior to that on the last day!

3. USB ports on car radios are genius – meant we could introduce Oscar to a variety of tunes outside Bolivian pop!  

04/09/2012 - 07/09/2012 - Vale's, Geysers and Salt Lakes

Looking down on the Valle de Muerte - Tony in his uber-stylish shorts!

Our mud home for the desert time

Wile E Cyote's rock - where's
the Road Runner?

So we were now well and truly in the desert, with our hostel room being a mud house – a relief as it meant it stayed relatively cool in the day but retained some heat at night. Had already decided we’d have a few days here, we managed to negotiate a good price on booking 3 tours with the same company. Unless you’re comfortable sorting a rental car and driving on highly dodgy roads or cycling in intense heat (hats off to IronRik – you’re more adventurous than us – http://www.ironrik.com/2010/04/today-was-exhausting.html) then San Pedro de Atacama is well and truly a tour town, with the main streets housing back to back tour companies!

Valle de Luna

The Andes, turning red

Hard-boiled eggs = warm hands!

Easier getting in than out

First taste of the desert was Vale de Luna, after the Vale de Muerte – awesome sights and great to get a brilliant vantage point for the sunset. The next morning was the killer – wasn’t great to be told to wait outside the hostel for the bus between 4:00am to 4:30am when the temperatures were below freezing (especially when the bus only turned up at 4:45am!). Three hours later, we were watching the sun rise at the Geysers del Tatio at 4,200m and -6⁰C which was an experience, even if we lost the feeling in a few limbs! Who knew holding hot hard boiled eggs could bring so much pleasure! We weren’t convinced that stripping off and jumping into a thermal pool was the solution, but eventually convinced each other that we couldn’t not, especially when there was a Kiwi already in there! Warmed up once in there, but wasn’t pleasant getting out!

Even the llamas were sticking close
to the geysers for warmth!

Tony had a new hat - he shall
now be known as T-Bird!

Another warming technique -
stand right next to the geyser

Some people approached the Laguna Tebenquiche
slightly differently to us - crazy Germans!

Getting in some practice for salt flat perspective pics...

Chilling out in a freezing, salty lake

Who's that handsome looking
guy in the reflection?

Last up the following afternoon was a trip to Laguna Cejar, a sink hole lake in the Salar de Atacama. It has a 40% concentration of salt, producing an effect of floating like the Dead Sea. It was again a case of conquering our fears of cold and getting wet - freezing water, but funny to float. The finale of this tour was watching the sunset with the Andes going red, this time accompanied by a couple of Pisco Sours and as many crisps as Tony felt he could get away with! The action packed few days didn’t stop there either – one of the main reasons for heading to the Atacama desert was for the star watching potential of the place, and whilst the show wasn’t quite on the level of Greg Quickes in Broome (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Greg-Quickes-Astro-Tours/167670281850?v=wall), getting a view of the butterfly cluster (http://www.spacepictures.org/displayimage-123.html) and hearing more crazy stats about the universe.

More red Andes, plus pisco sour

Some more reflection time

Jumpy jumpy, lovely lovely

Time for a final reflection

Key Learnings:

Say, that's a big telescope!
Unfortunately, Annaliza didn't own
the blanket...

1. Being at increased altitude has numerous effects, some stranger than others… (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1220/do-you-toot-more-at-high-altitude)

2. You get a diverse bunch on astronomy tours – a fellow Brit asking why we (humans) were interested in Extra-Terrestrial life and exploring Mars was cringe-worthy to say the least!

04/09/2012 - Crossing the Andes #2

The magnificent seven colour mountain - needs to be seen to be believed

An early start was followed by another lengthy bus trip across the Andes back into Chile. Again, we got some special views, so again I’ll leave the pictures to do it justice. Not sure that the film Cleanskin was an appropriate accompaniment to the views, but the film Battleship was a (ever-so!) slight improvement. Don’t recommend either though…

02/09/2012 - 03/09/2012 - Salta before the Salt flats

Another journey into the mountains

Mmmmm - Empanadas!

The views just kept on coming!

Salta completed our tour of Chilean and Argentinian cities – after this we were headed out of civilisation and into the desert! To acclimatise, we headed out on our first of several more traditional travelling tours, and after much deliberation we chose the Cachi trip over Cafayate (take care – uncertainty in travel arrangements can lead to many lost hours in checking reviews/blogs etc – sometimes you just have to take a punt!). Think we ended up choosing wisely – got amazing views as we gained altitude, and although we didn’t manage to see any Condors the cacti ‘forest’ in the desert was something to behold! We were horded into a restaurant for lunch at Cachi, where we made a quick exit with our pre-prepared sarnies – our Irish friends were last seen ordering a soup for 15 US$! Might have contained some special ingredients though, as they spent the return journey staring blankly at a map of the continent…

Cactus love #3 - hug a cactus!

Cactus love #1

Cactus love #2 - Tony's
best cactus impression...

Salta from above

Some sunset action

Got back to Salta earlier than anticipated, and just had time to head to the cable car giving views overlooking the city before sunset – a massive bonus as we’d accidentally run out of time the day before.

It's Swiss - time to relax!

Key Learnings:

1.Getting on a cable car in Argentina is a slightly scary experience, but nerves are put to rest when you see that it’s manufactured by the Swiss!