Barren Lands and Shivering Hands

I arrived in town, my face was speckled with the first kiss of the sun and my salt and dust clad clothes had the appearance of one finished journeying through barren lands. I had. In fact I hadn't washed in days or changed my clothes as there was little point. The dust was ubiquitous and everything would be dirty within an hour or so. Plus it was freezing and my one fleece and jumper was essential.

We started off early, the bus dropping us at the border to collect our jeep and guide. The sun shone on the craggy land yet at 3000m above sea level it was always cold. We piled in and headed up through gaps in the mountains, occasionally stopping at frozen volcanic lakes packed with minerals which gave them varying colours. Next up we stopped off to swim in hot springs, which was perfectly warm but resembled a rocky paddling pool. Still, as the shower hadn't worked for days in San Pedro it was a welcome stop.

Before finishing the first day's travelling we went on to hot pools of bubbling eggy mud, which was at our highest altitude of the trip: 4840m abov sea level and the equivalent to being well over half way up Everest. It was freezing and by the time we had reache our first stop for the night we had descenced to 4315m (exactly half way up Everest's 8800m) and altitude sickness had really set in. In theory you should only go up 500m a day safely, yet we had gone up over 2000m. My head was banging and I struggled for breath in the freezing cold bed which I had taken to immediately without food. The night was spent sleeplessly shivering and struggling for breath. Morning couldn't come too soon.

The next day passed grumpily recovering as we went to more frozen lakes and to see an active Volcano for the day before staying in a hotel made entirely of salt on the edge of the salt flats. We drank a few beers and went to bed early in preparation for sunrise over the salt flats. It was freezing cold but bearable. In fact anyone who thinks that I am sunning it up in South America is gravely mistaken, as Argentina was in the midst of winter and Bolivia and Peru, being on the spine of the Andes, are at such high altitudes that in spite of a strong sun, are always cold. Tshirts, shorts and flipflops haven't really been solely donned since Brazil and probably won't be until Ecuador/Columbia onwards.

The sunrise over the salt flat was amazing enough to be difficult to describe without the aid of photos, which still don't do justice, and many were taken. We continued on to a beautiful Island populated with numerous cacti and an amazing viewpoint over the salt flats. We returned to a wonderful breakfast and to take the archetypical photos that are taken on the Salt Flats, which look like you are crushing little people and standing on bottletops.

After luncheoning in a tourist town we moved on to by far my favourite part of the trip: The Train Graveyard. The train graveyard is a collection of rusting old steam trains abandoned in the desert, which had such a haunting presence. A reminder of times gone by abandoned and forgotten while the world speeds onwards. Plus it was a perfect place to flex the SLR, and I could have spent hours there.

The excursion ended and my friends Michelle, Jan, Kaisje and Maria left for La Paz, leaving me on my own in Uyuni: a backwards town with brightly clad locals and terrible hotels. I booked myself a room in a deadly quiet hotel and went to bed early. Tomorrow I would be leaving early for Potosi, the highest city in the world.