We left the wonderful Atacama desert bright and early on a Wednesday morning, not realising what was awaiting for us over the next three days. Our driver picked us up, then two young Argentine travel agents, and finally another British guy our age. We headed for the Bolivian border, completed all the usual checks and were transferred to a 4×4 at the edge of the National Park.
By now it was 9am, and everyone was just starting to wake up and get to know each other. We met Omar, the English-speaking guide, and Silvio, the driver, and set off. We left the border at the beautiful snow-capped volcano we had been observing from the Chilean side, and drove through last night’s snow which was covering the road.
We had an absolute rollercoaster of sites to see in the next few days. The first day was windy and cold, so we were all in up to five layers of clothes. We stopped at the white and green lagoons, which as their name suggested were named for the colours formed due to the minerals in the water. They were captivating and very scenic.
Afterwards we stopped at the edge of the lake and took advantage of the hot springs. Fortunately, by now, the wind had dropped, and we spent half an hour bathing in the hot waters, before running to the huts to change back into warm clothes.
We carried on further to the last point of the day, which as the Red Lagoon. Approaching this enlarge lake we could see lots of flamingoes and other birds in the water, but it was not until we got up close that we saw the lake in all its glory. Looking down across the lake towards the neighbouring mountain, the water was a deep ruby red, and was quite astonishing to see.
By now we had been travelling across dirt roads for eleven hours, and it seemed like nothing at all. As we went along, we passed animals like vicuñas, llamas, viscachas, foxes and rheas. It was such a wonderful day until we hit the ground with a bump. Our accommodation that night was a shared room in a hotel with no heating. However, we had a great time chatting and having a laugh, so even though it was well below freezing outside, it was toasty sleeping under five layers of polyester blankets.
We got up early for some more travels. Today was slightly different as there was less wind, so we managed to keep to only three layers of clothing plus gloves, hats and scarves. We toured through a series of incredible rock formations from the “World Cup Trophy” to camels. We climbed up some, and on others looked down into valleys with anaconda-shaped rivers at the bottom.
It was an amazing variety of things to see; but perhaps the most amazing was our fourth lake, the Black Lagoon. Observed from a high viewpoint, the lake below was indeed black, and had coots and seagulls nesting on the frozen water. In the distance there were llamas grazing, in what was a beautiful arching valley.
By this time, the five of us were buzzing about what we were seeing. We stopped off at a beer station to have a quinoa and cactus beer, before driving to our hotel which was built of salt. The 100,000 square kilometre salt flats, which we were nearing, provide a supply of salt blocks, like breeze blocks, which are used for building. Everything in our hotel was made of salt, and fortunately this time we had heating, but instead no hot water. Before we went to bed, we all trekked out to the edge of the village to see a wonderful clear night sky, with comets and a clearly visible Milky Way – amazing.
The last day had a very early start, but everybody was keen to get up and go, despite being slightly cramped in the 4×4. We managed to sleep for a couple of hours before we were woken up by a rather odd sight. We had driven for two hours across a salt plain and arrived at an “island” in the middle of this vast, flat white space. The island was full of enormous thirty foot high cactuses, which we climbed up through to observe a fantastic sun rise.
This was totally unexpected, and preceded a couple of hours of total mayhem, when we drove into the middle of the salt plain for pictures. But these were no ordinary pictures, as Omar used the white salt to take all sorts of perspective photos. We were running away from dinosaurs, riding elephants, tightrope walking on the laces of trainers, and most funny of all were videoed crawling out of a wine bottle, dancing, and crawling back in. The Argentine girls were the ringleaders in these “mad” photos and videos.
Our final two sites involved visiting a graveyard of old railway engines and carriages, followed by a lunch of delicious llama steaks. It was then time to say goodbye to our new friends, and head off on our own further into Bolivia. We have perhaps had the three most incredible days of all our travels so far, and cannot wit to see what else Breathtaking Bolivia has to offer.
