Uyuni

Arriving at Uyuni at midnight was not fun. We knew the hostel was near the bus station but in the dark this made no difference and we had to take a taxi. 10Bob (yes a whole english pound) and 2 mins later the taxi pulled up - feel we were slightly taken advantage of - as Terry would say - "we had our pants pulled down"!!
Uynui at night was freezing. Our hostel forunately had the most comfortable beds and our dorm (yes our first dorm) had a heater - toasty!!

Despite it being an 8 bed dorm, there was only one other couple, Charlotte and Josh. We started talking and once we had booked our next adventure (Salt Flats Tour) spent the majority of the next day with them, lunch, afternoon beers in the sun, dinner and cocktails in the one of the best pubs ever - the extreme fun pub!! The pub had like an artifical beach made out of salt, the tables were made from salt. The food was good and cocktails arrived in clay penis and vagina mugs!! (waiting on the pictures from Charlotte) Our group went from 4 to about 12 of us playing a German drinking game with some young German boys and an Irish Couple that we booked our salt flat tour with. Needless to say Terry has a sore head the following morning when we got up for our tour!!

3 days / 2 night Salt Flats Tour
Having heard so many bad reviews about Tour Companies (drunk drivers, broken down jeeps and generally bad times) we were a little anxious about what we were in for!! We chose Andes Salt Expeditions, depsite some bad reviews, the guy that sold us the tour actually spoke english and promised us an english speaking guide. We bumped into an old friend from england and her boyfriend (Jody and Lewis) in potosi and they had managed to book onto the same tour as us - so we felt a little responsible if the tour all went tits up!

For some unknown reason every tourist in Uynui seemed to have booked with our tour company that morning and 24 people waited outside ther office...... and waited.... and waited!!!
Eventually after 90 minutes of pure choas we set off in our jeep, with Jodie and Lewis and 2 German girls, our english speaking guide (Juan) and the director of the company as our driver!!

After a stop at the Train Cemetry...... which was basically the rusty shells of old trains - obviously no longer in use!!
Captain Terry..

Weightlifter Becs!!

We drove to the depo to collect our food and sleeping bags for the next 3 days. Suddenly we were unexpectedly changing vehicles. Apparently we were in the directors own 4x4 and had to swap to our actual car with a new driver (Roberto).

Finally we were on the road and set off for the salt flats. Our guide Juan was so angry at the director for the mornings choas, but after a bit of ranting he calmed and was a brilliant guide for the rest of the trip!!

And so we arrived at the salt flats.... just miles and miles of flat salt!!

with a few salt piles...

Despite the sun being out it was a bit chilly. After a while we pulled up with another van to have lunch out the back of the jeep.

Not exactly the lama BBQ we were expecting!!

After lunch we took some pictures (assisted by Juan) and played a few games with blind folds....

Once back in the jeep - Lewis thought it would be a good idea to blind fold the driver to see if he performed better than we did..

sure enough we started to go round in circles!!

Next up was Fish Island. (called so because the Island is the shape of a fish). Fish Island was just an island with thousands of Cacti... oh and 2 lamas!!

Cacti..

As we drove on to our first hostel the sun began to set over the salt flats....

We arrived at the Salt hostel... not as cold and much nicer than expected...

although candles were a must as electricity went out at 9pm!

Next morning we were up at 6 to see the sun rise..

Day 2 involved a lot of driving to different lagoons, deserts and andes....
Cachi Lagoon..

Flamingoes...

Red lagoon (laguna colarada)

Siloli Desert and the Tree Stone

Our second hostel was much more basic and FREEZING!!!
After dinner we huddled round the fire and played cards.

Early night due to the freezing temperature and because he had to be up at 5am!!

Day 3
We set off early to see the geysers and funaroles (steam and vapour and boiling mud) smelt like rotten eggs!

It was so cold ... when we got the hot springs - it seemed crazy to undress into our swimwear!! but once we were in the temp of the water was lovely. so hot the steam blinded you!

So our feet defrosted but my hair got wet and iced up!

Our trip came to an end as we wanted to be tranferred striaght to San Pedro de Atacama (over the border into Chile). We said our goodbyes and headed to the border with our Irish friends!

A freezing experience - a bit of a slow start - but amazing views and good time had by all!!