The Uyunian Adventure!

Finding words to describe the beauty and the isolation, the vastness and the pureness of Salar de Uyuni and the surrounding area seems impossible. I only hope this part of Bolivia remains untouched because it is truly spectacular!

We began our trip at Café Paris in Cochabamba’s main plaza! The first leg of our journey was a 5 hour bus trip from the bus terminal in Cochabamba to a random street in Oruro. We thought we had 20minutes to find our bus to Uyuni, which seemed like an impossible feat. We asked everyone we saw where the bus left from, and everyone gave us a different answer. We were literally running around the streets of Oruro at 11:30 at night to find our bus. Miraculously, a woman heard us panicking and frantic, and told us to knock on the bus company’s closed, locked door. Sure enough, we were in the right place, and the bus did not leave until 1 AM. So, the workers of Todo Turismo were nice enough to let us sit in their office until our bus arrived.

We boarded our sleeper bus at 1:15 AM and tried to sleep through the night, but a bumpy road will sure prohibit any sound sleeping. We arrived in Uyuni around 8:30 AM, and it was absolutely freezing! We dropped our luggage at the tour office and found a quick breakfast. We had time for a little shopping, which I loved! The town of Uyuni seems so quaint and cute! I wish we had more time to explore, but the adventures that laid ahead were far beyond what I imagined!

Around 10:30 AM we piled into our Toyota Land Cruiser 4-wheel-drive and headed off on our adventure! Oscar, our driver and tour guide, and Rosemary, our cook, were so amazing throughout the entire weekend! Oscar let Caroline and I name his car! We decided that Panchito was a fitting name! Our first stop was the Train Cemetery. This is a huge tourist attraction, but I found it not nearly as interesting as what we were about to experience! We spent about ten minutes climbing on trains and taking pictures! Our next stop was SALAR DE UYUNI, the world’s largest salt flat! It is 12,106 square kilometers and is over 12,00 feet. The Salar is a center of salt extraction—about 20,000 tons per year! Salar de Uyuni is truly magical—it is just the white ground, the blue sky with amazing clouds, and you! We walked around in awe for a while, snapping pictures and playing in the salt mounds. We then visited Cactus Island (Icawanku), which is located in the middle of the salt lake! The island is covered in tons of cacti, and we even spotted some llamas! Rosemary prepared our lunch here on the island. We enjoyed llama meat and vegetables as we still we in shock and awe that we were actually on Salar de Uyuni! Our next stop was Galaxia, a cave that used to be under the sea and is about 2200 years old. It was beautiful, and you could see the leaves that were fossilized into the top and bottom of the cave. Next to Galaxia was the Devil’s Cemetery—a pre-Incan burial ground. There were actual skulls and bones in the small holes made by the founders. After a full day of activities and very little sleep, we headed to our “hotel” in the small town of San Pedro. It was very basic—only electricity at night, concrete floors and beds, no heat, etc. But, I survived!

We began our second day with a huge breakfast courtesy of Rosemary! We ate, got ready, and packed up the car. Our first stop was miles and miles of volcanic rock formations, which went on as far as the eye could see. The formations were not that big, but very intricate and fascinating. Next were the mountains of color, which were layered with all different shades! Near the mountains of color, Oscar showed us an active volcano that straddles the border of Chile and Bolivia! We were so close to Chile! Our next two stops were two different lagoons, which were both amazingly beautiful and serene. Thousands of flamingos lived in both lagoons. We had another amazing lunch at the second lagoon. After lunch, we drove a while to the huge rock formations, which included the infamous Tree of Rock! Our last stop for the day was Lagoon Colorado, which literally has red water! It was so cold and windy that we could not spend much time outside of the car! Our hotel for the second night was a little nicer than the first, but still very basic and VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY COLD! We met some fellow travelers from Argentina and Spain and ended up playing dice games with them!

Our last day in Uyuni was insanely busy! We got up at 5 AM to head to the hot, thermal bath, which turned out to be lukewarm and it was way too cold to even think about taking my two shirts, three jackets, gloves, hat, and scarf off. The geysers, however, were amazing! The sun was just rising and it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen! Our very last stop on the tour was the Green Lagoon. The water was definitely green, but no wildlife can live in this water because of its high levels of toxins and minerals. After the lagoon, we began our 8 hour drive back to the city of Uyuni with a few stops along the way—Dali Rocks, a few small towns, lunch, and more crazy rock formations!

Around 6 PM we pulled into downtown Uyuni. We grabbed a quick dinner and headed to the bus station, which was complete mayhem! We arrived in Oruro around 2:30, and a lady traveling with us was so sick because of the drastic change in altitude, the bus company helped us get a private cab back to Cochabamba!

After three days of no shower, the first thing I did was shower when I got back to our house! It was an amazing few days of seeing and experiencing things so unreal! I will never forget the natural, untouched, simple beauty of Uyuni! Also, I traveled with 5 other women—4 of then over 40 and one the same age as me—and it was so fun! We have all come from very different backgrounds and we are all at different places in live, but we got along so well and had so much fun!

I have had such amazing experiences in Bolivia, and am so thankful each day that I have had the opportunity to travel and get to know this amazing country and its amazing people!