Hola Amigos.
So I think the last time I wrote I was in Uyuni, Bolivia getting ready for my 3 day tour of the salt flats!
Day 1 consisted of BEAUTIFUL weather: the train cemetery, Salar de Uyuni and then 6 hours of driving to our hostel ... if you could call it that :) The train cemetery was pretty neat. It was filled with touristas just like myself ... so I was a little overwhelmed to be honest. It was incredible but it is a little funny when people see you taking a picture ... they decide they like it and they decide to wait in line and take the same one! Oh well ... at least they liked your idea!
The Salar was absolultely incredible. Because it was wet season in Bolivia when I was there... instead of the usual white salt flats ... it was completely covered in water. We literally had to drive through like 3 feet of sludge water to get to the nice stuff but when we arrived it was honestly the largest mirror I had every experienced and was mega beautiful! We hung off the jeep while our driver (who was supposed to be steering) hung out the open door with 5 cameras on his wrist ... cheeze amigos. Haha gotta love Bolivia! We spent some time in the Salar and walked around ... honestly it hurt my feet so bad, I had little cuts on my feeties for days but it was just so incredible I could dig it! We ate llama and rice at the salt hotel and hopped into the jeep (with no spedometer) for our 6 hour tour (going literally 200km an hour with no seat belts ahhh) to interior Bolivia ... where we would be spending the night!
We woke up from our sleeping quarters ... and it had turned from a beautiful sunny climate to freeze your ass off Bolivia. It continued to rain and sleet for day 2, but that did not stop us from seeing countless lagoons, volcanoes and desert rocks! It was incredible still ... but unfortunately the umph was just not as much as the first day ... probably because of the weather and the increasing altitude! I definately felt it. We got up to something like 4500m and were chewing coca-leaves like mad! The second hostel was a huge improvement ... we even had electricity and indoor bathrooms :) Got a good nights sleep, one hell of a head cold and headed off to the hot springs on day 3. After like 3 days with no shower ... it was much needed :) We then saw about 5 more lagoons, 1 huge volcano and the Salvador Dali desert and we were off to San Pedro de Atacama, Chile!
The killer was the desenct down. We literally went from 4500m to 2000m in 20 minutes and with a head cold ... it was KILLER for the ears! OUCH! BUT as soon as I hit the heat in San Pedro it all got better.
San Pedro, is exactly what you would picture a desert town to be ... not much :) All the buildings are made up of mud and sand ... but because it was Chile it was SO damn expensive. I knew I couldnt stay long with rates like that so I booked the cheapest Sandboarding adventure within DEATH VALLEY I could find!
Although it was not as exhilarating as the North American snowboarding ... I have to give the South American past time some credit! It was freaking hard. Similar to powder ... but much heavier and not as much speed ahaha so you can imagine how much my back leg was aching! It was so much fun though and I literally ended up with sand in places I did not know existed! The tour ended up with a sunset in Valle de Lune. Incredible sunset ... and polished it off with the Chilean drink PISCO SOUR.
The next day I said goodbye to my friend Frani and made my way to Arica, Chile ... the coast ... finally.
I spent about 3 days in Arica, met some great people and just beached it, drank and ate ... too much. But the heat and the food was much needed because now I am in Peru ... and I already need to go to the bathroom.
Bring on rice soup and chicken hearts ... thats what I just had for lunch.
Love you all :)
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