Bolovin' it (apologies)

OK, so we've got some catching up to do so this may be epic...

Flo had got us as far as Mendoza and we've come a fair way since then as some of you have pointed out (thanks bob - you suck).

At Mendoza we said goodbye to the majority of the big group of people that we had seemed to collect over the last week hanging onto only sophie the fake kiwi for our journey to Salta, another reasonably sized city in the north of Argentina nicknamed Salta la Linda (or Salta the Beautiful), somewhat of an overstatement in my opinion, it was pretty in parts but maybe im just being picky!

On our first day we took the cable car up to the top of Cerro San Bernardo for a fantastic view of the town and the lovely concrete waterfall which they are inordinately proud of.

Salta is also famous for its beautiful surroundings and so having wandered the town for a bit we decided that to build on our successful vehicle rental experience again (and to lower the A$200 per person cost of the tours) that a car might be a better option. So after an ENORMOUS asado the night before we woke up ready to receive our "VW Gol" (for some reason no 'f' on it out here - answers on a postcard) and soon we were off to explore the surrounding province of Salta.

This, I think, was our first view of what we actually had envisioned before we came out here - miles of red rock and cactus fields stretching for miles with small villages dotted along the dusty dirt roads, so this was what we were treated to for most of the first day of our 2 day moto-trek.

We spent the first night in the smallest little town which had two hospedajes (family run guest houses) and one restaurant which i cant figure out how it still survives since we were the only customers and the food was a wee bit shonky! anyway, day two saw us joining the famous Ruta 40, another rough, dusty/gravelly road along which Flo and Sophs went a bit nuts taking photos of rocks, which may or may not have looked like enormous genitals, whilst i sat patiently behind the wheel.

Our return to Salta lasted only one more night before we booked our passage out of there and towards the border town of La Quiaca where we would walk across the least official looking border crossing into Bolivia (apparently loads of people completely miss it only to find that they have to come back to get the official stamps when they try to book any transport). The town on the other side of the border is called Villazon and here we booked ourselves into a surprisingly nice hotel (we'd heard some shitty things about Bolivia) and then pretty much crashed. The next day was, well, a fucker.

At about 3500m about sea level this was the highest we'd been thus far and it hit me fucking hard! i spent most of this day alternating between restless sleep and a stonking headache. which was nice. i think flo was feeling rough as well but was playing nice and looking after me! So we both spent a couple of days in Villazon, both waiting for the train and trying to acclimatise.

The train from Villazon to a small town called Tupiza, saw us meeting a couple more kiwis (real ones this time). A couple called Gavin and Alana from Auckland were sat infront of us and we quickly got chatting, over the noise of the hideous Bolivian music - seriously, its shocking! On arrival in Tupiza we were quickly hustled and lead to a hotel by a child of about 10.

We decided the next day would be well spent pretending to be coyboys - we the 4 of us (still with the kiwis) bought the silly hats and everything (in fact ive kinda grown attached to mine and i know flo still has hers so who knows) We all felt very cool pretending to be in control of the horses who clearly had no time for the fucking idiots sat on their backs trying to
a) make them go the wrong way
b) make them go at any kind of speed!

But the scenery was amazing and despite the pain in my but cheeks for the next few days I really enjoyed it.

Tupiza was also to be our starting point for a 4 day/3 night 4wd tour taking us on a big circuit past all the beautiful country around Tupiza finishing up in the Salar de Uyuni salt flats. So at 9am on the following morning we waited outside the hotel to meet our driver for the next few days and to see our magnificent carriage (a beat up land cruiser).

We actually ended up with 2 drivers which, you would have thought would be a good and reassuring thing, until we quickly realisied that although Jose (the big boss man) was a experienced pro, Jose-Luis was most definitely a rookie and at times we all felt that we would do a better job driving than him, even flo and she doesnt even have a licence and apparently has "trouble with corners"!

This was at its most apparent when he took us up the narrow winding roads along what I believe is one of the worlds highest motorable roads, practically clipping the edges of the sharp drops as he went along despite leaving a couple of meters between the car and the nice safe safe wall on the other side of the road.


MAP:
This is a map of our route over the 4 days that we were travelling from Tupiza (in the middle on the right) down, along the Argentine and Chilean borders, and then up and towards Uyuni (in the middle) by way of the salt flats.

The first day was spent mainly just getting us into position for the spectacular sights of the next day, not to say that the scenery wasnt amazing nor, as mentioned above, that the ride wasnt interesting to say the least!

Day 2 started EARLY at 4:45 which was pretty rough but at least we go to see the sunrise over the hills. The highlight of this day was set to be the natural hot springs which we were meant to get to about midday so you can see how long we were driving for. The hot spring was lovely with a magnificent view over the nearby hills. The rough part of this experience came after we got out of the warm water again - this change in temperature, coupled with the altitude, caused flo to 'spaz out' (technical term meaning feel light headed and then cause her to faint as we struggled to get her out of the road and into the nearby building) This obviously caught peoples attention since later in our tour we were told by an aussie how "this girl fainted as she came out of the pools" and we had to explain that that was us! The rest of the day was spent admiring lakes and eggy smelling geysers! We spent the night at altitude - 4270m and damn it was cold!

The next morning we started at Laguna Colorada, home to thousands of Flamingos, which was a spectacular sight first thing in the morning. Beyond this this was mostly another day to get us from A to B, but this is not to say that the scenery wasnt amazing, which it was, its just that you get rather blase about beautiful hills when they are all that you can see for 10hrs a day from the back of a 4x4! However, what was exciting was that this would be the night that we were to spend in the Salt Hotel - yes, it is as the name would suggest. When we arrived we decided that it would be cool to make use of the luxury that was the free hot showers of which we had so far been deprived. I was waiting my turn and turned around to see Steve Vance (university friend) walking in to the Hotel! I think I freaked him out a bit. So Flo and I chatted to Steve and his girlfriend Avney for a bit which was cool but that was the last we saw of Flo for the evening for reasons I wont go into for the sake of decency save to say that in trying to demonstrate how she was feeling to our Bolivian driver Jose she utilised a particularly upsetting mime! (ask her about it sometime, preferably when I'm not around). She did miss out on watching me try to play 5-a-side at altitude and some tasty llama steaks though!

The next day we bundled a rough feeling Flo into the back of the car and set off for the highlight of the trip - the salt flats themselves. The salt flats are simply massive. The perfectly flat salt stretches for miles around and are spectacular. Any description would do them a disservice so just look at the pictures! They also allow for the classic comedy perspective shots which seem obligatory for all visiting tourists! enjoy!


After spending a bit too long trying to pefect these we then moved on to Uyuni for a few lazy days in slightly more luxurious surroundings which i will leave for a later, and hopefully more concise blog!

big love, word and peace out.

nick