Bolivia page 2
A view of the flats from atop the "Isla de Pescado" - fish island. So named because it is shaped like a fish...
The island is mostly populated by very tall cacti. I doubt even Nick would be taller than most of these...
The altitude seems to have a funny effect on some people... or maybe its all the cocoa leaves they tell you to chew to combat the altitude sickness.
Its not all salt... and its not all flat either. In many places, the salt has dried and hardened to the point where it cracks.
Something I'm starting to learn - it is much easier to take spectacular photographs when one is surrounded by spectacular scenery. This is the sunset over the first town we stopped at to sleep - San Juan... literally in the middle of nowhere.
Our guide, on the roof of our jeep, loading our supplies. This was before he got completely plastered on the second night....
Sometime during the second day we happened apon a set of railway tracks... again, seemingly in the middle of nowhere...
See if you can spot the route that our vehicle took.
Everywhere we went, we seemed to be redefining the meaning of the term "middle of nowhere". South of the flats, there were peculiar rocky outcrops everwhere, carved out by the harsh winds that sweep these parts. It is difficult to tell, but it is actually very cold out here because of the altitude (above 4000m in most places).
Piles of rocks... and lots of holes in the ground - an archaeologists paradise... well... maybe a geologists.
Flamingos populate the sparsely spaced lakes which dot the landscape. In the background, volcanoes can be seen...
You can run, but you can't hide....
On the subject of unusual-looking rock formations.
Our vehicle got very dusty very quickly. Have a wild guess at who was responsible for the kangaroo... ("pare" means "stop")
On the second night, we met up with another group who happened to have a guitar, so we had a bit of a sing-along.
The sing along quickly turned into a jam session. Drums were improvised with the chairs... and a digeridoo (sp?) was improvised with a pipe and tuned to "D".
The morning of the third day saw us visiting a geyser.
Nearby, there were volcanic springs, of course... which were very smokey and smelly.
Aside from being very smelly, they were very warm - very welcome at 6am out in what was effectively a very high, very cold desert.
We were able to bathe in pools of water supplied by the hot springs while the ice slowly melted around us.
For those of you who were wondering about the condition of my feet... bad, but getting better.
We journeyed further south until we hit the border with Chile. We were just dropping some people from our group off.