#spud groshong
Recently I went to Chile and Bolivia with my friend Brian Stowell. After a few days in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile we took a guided tour into Bolivia to the Salar de Uyuni. The first day of the trip was filled with delays due to bad weather in the mountains but once we got going it was a pretty memorable journey. From the Immigration check point in San Pedro we headed into the mountains to the Bolivian border. Being American we were told we were gonna need a large number of things to get into Bolivia. Passport, 2 passport photos, 2 color copies of our passports, Our full itinerary while in the country, yellow fever vaccination papers (which Brian didn’t have but when asked he just handed the man the money for the visa and he didn’t ask again) and $160 USD for a 10 year visa.
After customs the group we rode with was separated into smaller groups of 6, assigned a Land Cruiser and driver. Our group was 3 Russians, 2 American (Brian and I) and 1 Chilean woman who spoke little english but was forced to translate, I felt bad for her she was not comfortable with it at all. First stop on our trip was the national park office to pay the $150 Boliviano park fee.
Once we paid our fees we were on our way to Laguna Blanca and Laguna Verde before starting the climb up into the mountains. As we gained altitude it began to rain to the point some of the stops were almost pointless, one stop was a geyser and Brian didn’t even get out of the vehicle. Our driver decided at one point it would be a smart idea to wait till morning to go to the one spot everyone was looking forward, Laguna Colorada. The hostel was a damp concrete building with dorm rooms of 5 beds in each. It appeared that each tour group had their own little section to the area. I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of very heavy rain on the roof and noticed one of the people in our room had got in bed with his girlfriend, I thought they were a little too old to be getting it on in a hostel dorm situation. In the morning I found out it was cause there was a leak above him and it was dripping directly on his head.
In the morning we packed our Cruiser and set off for what I thought would be the coolest part of the trip, Laguna Colorada. On a clear day the lake shines a pinkish red shade and is littered with Flamingos. When we arrived the sky was overcast so the color of the water wasn’t as intense as I had seen in photos but the flamingos were everywhere. It was amzaing.
Our next stop along this tour was Desert Siloli, It was a patch of desert high up in the Andes, filled with wind beaten sandstone that made for pieces of rock almost out of a Dali painting. By this time I was starting to feel slightly acclimated to the elevation. We had climbed something some to 5000 feet in elevation. The day prior I would lose my breath just getting out of the vehicle.
Later on that day we had stopped along side a few lakes, most of which were underwhelming after Laguna Colorada. We stopped for lunch near a Volcano called Tomasamil. We roamed a little but It started to rain rather hard so everyone ran for the dinning area. After Lunch and the rain we stopped at some place that Brian said reminded him of Moab, Utah. It was beautiful, Odd rock formations and mountains in the distance. From there we drove for hours both Brian and I crammed in the back seat, we slowly made our way to the town of Julaca where we stopped for a stretch. Julaca was a tiny town with only a few buildings. There was a bar, a general store, a run down school where a few kids were playing football in the yard. We walked around for a little bit while everyone else grabbed drinks at the store.
The road to the hotel was a dirt track slightly elevated above the flooded salt flats surrounding the road. We were told since it had been raining a lot lately that the Salt Flats would be flooded but I didn’t think it would be a few feet of water. The hotel on night 2 was a bit nicer, we only shared rooms with those we were traveling with, there was 30 minutes of WIFI and a shower with hot water. That night it stormed harder than I think I’ve ever heard in my life. The storm had caused more flooding on the salt flats messing up the route we were supposed to take to get to the Salar. Instead of driving directly across the Salt flats we had to go back to Julaca and to Uyuni.
It was about 7:30 am we had already been on the road for something like 3 hours when we stopped for breakfasting Rio Grande. The 3 land cruisers that were traveling together all parked near each and the guides took out their tables and opened jam and nutella, heated water for coffee and tea, there was even bananas and yogurt. It was a feast in the middle of a dirt road in a sleepy town.I always enjoy these little stops in towns just cause its great to see where people live. Once everyone had finished breakfast we continued driving something like 3 more hours to Uyuni. We stopped at what can only be described as a train graveyard before heading to the Salt flats. The train graveyard was filled with rusty old trains that were no longer in service, most of which were covered in graffiti. The day was already frustrating, no one had really told us what was going on with the salt flats, in my frustration I don’t think I enjoyed the trains as much as I normally would. After the train graveyard everyones moods changed when we were told we were headed to the Salar (Salt Flats). The salt flats were slightly flooded but we were still able to drive out on them. When we stopped the water was a little more than ankle deep and warm. It felt incredible. We had spend about an hour out on the flats taking photos and goofing off before we headed back to Uyuni for a late lunch.
At this point, Brian and I had no idea what was coming next. For a moment we were under the impression we would stay in Uyuni for the rest of the day when our driver dropped us off at the information center. The truth was we were to head back to San Pedro immediately. Along the way we would stop in a small town called San Cristobal. Just as we arrived there was sort of a sunday parade going on in the town, which we got to see before hitting the road again.
After leaving San Cristobal we would only stop for the restroom or breifly for the drivers we were following to discuss how they were going to make it through the many flooded streams from the storms. Our last night in Bolivia was spend in a town I couldn’t ever point out on a map in a small wet hostel. We arrived long after the sun was set and left long before the sun would rise. We had drove for 6 hours, most of which we all slept, before we reached the border. There was a huge line this time of all sorts of people. After about an hour of waiting we got our passports stamped and we were on our way back to Chile.
