Three days ago we embarked on a three-day jeep tour of the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia.
We took a very bumpy overnight bus to the small town of Uyuni where we had breakfast and set off in a Toyota Landcruiser. Our guide acted as driver, chef and mechanic. His name was Agostino and he was really funny...even with his limited English.
Day 1: First, we drove to a train cemetary outside of Uyuni. Some of the trains were only 50 years old, but they were really rusted and looked positively ancient. One of them was a train that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid robbed.
Next, we drove to a small town that makes figurines and houses out of the salt from the salt flats. They also collect the salt and sell it to the rest of Bolivia. Bathrooms there were pricey, but worth it after bouncing around in the jeep for an hour.
Then, we stopped to take crazy photos. Something about the vast salt plains skews perspective in photos. We attempted to take some creative photos. See the giant bottle w/ Stephen and Athena behind it and the enormous book with Athena and I holding it up...
The third stop the first day was to 'Fish Island', an island in the middle of the vast salt plains. It had enormous cacti that had been growing for thousands of years. They only grow a cm each year...so you can see how old they are by comparing their size with Stephen...
The entire are used to be under the sea millions of year ago. Plate movement pushed up the Andes and then the hot sun evaporated the water creating the salt flats. The salt was 10 meters deep and went on for miles and miles. It was very interesting scenery although we kept falling asleep in the jeep after our night on the bus.
We took a very bumpy overnight bus to the small town of Uyuni where we had breakfast and set off in a Toyota Landcruiser. Our guide acted as driver, chef and mechanic. His name was Agostino and he was really funny...even with his limited English.
Day 1: First, we drove to a train cemetary outside of Uyuni. Some of the trains were only 50 years old, but they were really rusted and looked positively ancient. One of them was a train that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid robbed.
Next, we drove to a small town that makes figurines and houses out of the salt from the salt flats. They also collect the salt and sell it to the rest of Bolivia. Bathrooms there were pricey, but worth it after bouncing around in the jeep for an hour.
Then, we stopped to take crazy photos. Something about the vast salt plains skews perspective in photos. We attempted to take some creative photos. See the giant bottle w/ Stephen and Athena behind it and the enormous book with Athena and I holding it up...
The third stop the first day was to 'Fish Island', an island in the middle of the vast salt plains. It had enormous cacti that had been growing for thousands of years. They only grow a cm each year...so you can see how old they are by comparing their size with Stephen...
The entire are used to be under the sea millions of year ago. Plate movement pushed up the Andes and then the hot sun evaporated the water creating the salt flats. The salt was 10 meters deep and went on for miles and miles. It was very interesting scenery although we kept falling asleep in the jeep after our night on the bus.
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