Day 22 - travel to Uyuni
This may be somewhat of a null day as it was mostly travelling
We got up at 7 in order to catch a public bus at 8. The bus eventually turned up at 8;25 and it was disgusting.
The seats were tiny and stained and we were informed that there would be no toilet stops in the 5 hour journey...
Our new tour guide JJ informed us that for just $2 more a person we could have got our own nice, privtae bus, thanks gap.
When the bus stopped for fuel one of our group asked if she could leave to use the toilet, she was told it was ok. 2 minutes later we were driving off without her and had to shout at the us driver to stop.
we eventually got to the town where we would get our train from around 2 and after checking in our luggage and picking up a couple of snacks we boarded. This time we were in first class! Unfortunately it was bolivian first class and was still prettyn shit. Although it did have a tv in the corner which was blasting out some really crappy bolivian pop song on loop. After about 20 mins one of the other passengers got up and disconected the TV, thank god.
I spent most of the journey sleeping and we arrived in Uyuni around 11. We then had to collect our bags which was a classsic bolivian affair. They just dumped all the bags in a room and then let you loose trying to find yours. It took about 30mins before everyone had eentually fought their way to their own bag.
We got some 4x4´s to our hotel where Tom informed us that there was a place in the guidebook called the extremely fun pub, how could we say no?
Most of the people were pretty exhuasted but a couple of us went out anyway. In the pub we found anothwer gap group who showed us some awesome pictures from the salt flats and we even met one of the people that will join our group for the brazil tour. We were kicked out at 3am which was great seeign as we had a 7 start the next day
Day 23 - salt flats
We got up at 7 and after breakfast all piled in to our 4x4´s and headed out into the slat flats. In our jeep we had me, mike, tom, matt and sam which was a pretty awesome combination. Unfortunately Rob decided to stay in the hotel at Uyuni as he was feeling really ill and thought that -20 at night would do him no good.
First we went to the train graveyard which is where they dump all the out of service trains which was a bit weird. It was just a large collection of rusting trains by the track side.
After that we headed out into the salt flats occasionally stopping to look at a lagoon or similar. It was pretty epic, just a completely white flat surface surrounded by huge mountains.
We eventually got to the spot where everyone gets their funny perspective photos done. It´s completely white and flat so people take funny photos by putting things in the foreground to make them apear bigger. We came prepared and brought a toy car and a barbie in order to try and get some good photos but it didn´t really work. The best thing we got was a group video of us all running into a pringles can.
We then continued on towards our hotel for the night. Along the wasy we witnessed one of the most beautiful sunsets i´ve ever seen. At one point it the light reflected perfectly off the water on the slat flats and created a mirror type effect.
The hotel for the night was made completely out of salt, a bit like the ice hotel but permenant. It had salt tables, chairs and even beds. It had power for 2 hours at night then nothing. It was really basic and freezing cold but an experience.
day 24 - Desert
We got up reasonably early the next day (not that many of ys got much sleep due to the cold) and piled back into our 4x4´s in order to head out into the desert in the middle of the salt flats and see a volcano. We had been told by the gap group that we met in the extremely fun pub that the drivers may well tell you its too snowy to go on and will want to turn back but you have to insist that you go on, even if it means digging your car out a couple of times. This in mind we headed into the desert and soo found it was, as the group had said, covered in snow. No problem for our 4x4´s though we though. Unfortunately we were mistaken, although they claimed to be 4x4´s this was bolivia and our one was in fact only 2 wheel drive. We assumed it once was 4x4 and had broken but when it came up against a relatively tame slope covered in snow all that happened was the bqack wheels spun and dug its self a hole. They didn´t think to pack snow chains or a shovel so we had to dig it out by hand and give it another shot. The driver put it into first and revved as hard as he could, digging him self straight back into a hole. Despite some of our groups tips about going into a higher gear and not just trying to power up in first he continuedn to do the same thing. We´d dig him out then he power back into the same hole. After digging a path up the hill, lining it with rocks and dirt to try and give him some grip and lots and ltos of pushing and digging out we eventually made it up. The other 4x4´s which were actually 4x4 made it up easily which was pretty annoying. We continued on to the volcano look out point which was pretty cool seeing an active volcano. Unfortuantely if you leave a bunch of youngs boys in snow for any length of time you are bound to get a snowballl fight. Eventually everyone joined in and we started a huge snowball which was eventually joined by some other people in the same place and everyone had a great time. Unfortuantely i didn´t have waterproof hiking boots like everyone else so my feet we soaked and really cold.
After finishing with the snowball fight we headed on for another 30 mins, by this point my feet felt absolutely freezing so i decided to take off my shoes and socks and try and warm them up. They were blue and bruised all over and Tom informed me that that was the early signs of frostbite and i should get themn warm pretty quick. We taped the hand warmer things to them, towelled them dry and wrapped them up in thermals.
After another hour or so we got stuck in the snow again and after 30 mins of trying to dig them out the drivers refused to go on and we had to turn back. (Probablly the best decision as a different group plowed on eventually got stuck in the middle of nowhere and had to be air lifted out).
We eventually got to a small town which was absolutely barren and stayed in a what was kinda like someones spare room but third world. There were 8 matresses cramed into each room and it was quite an experience..
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