The main attraction of the trip to Bolivia was driving through the spacious Salar the Uyuni. The enormous salt flat is visited by thousands of tourists each year for the experience is absolutely uncomparable. Uyuni, just like Atacama, used to be a lake that due to climate changes dried off leaving a thick layer of salt. It is nearly 11,000 square kilometers of salty nothingness!
We began our drive at 5 a.m. in order to reach Isla Incahuasi at sunrise.
Sometimes we visit places that are so surreal, that even while being there it feels as if in a very strange dream. This was definitely one of them. When we departed it was completely dark and we rather snoozed off than paid attention during the early-morning drive. But being half-awake I looked through the window and in the first ominously red glow of the sunrise hovering over the horizon and nothing but empty space and a remote silhouette of a mountain it all already looked bizzare.
It was pretty bright when we arrived to Isla Incahuasi. It was unreal. In the middle of white nothingness there was a middle-sized island of proper rocky soil, formed in a hill. Gigantic cacti were growing all over the island. We did climb the hill during sunrise and it was spectacular. The vast salt plains looked like water or like very flat clouds from above.
We made a stop in the middle of nowhere, just to take some funny photos of the group on the flats. Apparently, there is a tradition of taking photos on Uyuni with godzillas or dinosaurs. You know, the kind of photos where something small stands close in the lens so that it creates the illusion that it's big? Uyuni was perfect for that.
The enormous white space was hypnotizing. I was fascinated with how in a natural way the salt forms hexagons on the surface, I assume that it's some matter of the structure of particles. But it was clearly visible and looked as if someone designed it.
You know, the advertising of Uyuni is very deceptive. On basically every advert Uyuni is photographed during some very specific moment when during the rainy season the flats fill up with a shallow layer of water. This creates mindblowing reflections of the surroundings, the mountains, the sky, the people and vehicles. Well, but this happens very rarely. After having those images in mind the actual Salt Flats dissapointed us, slightly. But only slightly. We enjoyed the experience pretty much anyway.
Our tour terminated in the city of Uyuni. This was an actual experience of a Bolivian city. I think that the photos tell quite a lot, there's no need for additional explainations. It was a very interesting and valuable experience, but I don't think I would feel too comfortable staying there alone for a while.
People seemed to be very devoted to their traditions when it comes to clothing, customs.
Uyuni turned a train cemetary into an attraction. There is this place where old trains decayed and I must say that was pretty cool. People were walking on the wagons, climbed them, under supervision of our guides.
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