Al Norte

So much has happened since I took this trip with my friend Cora, so that unfortunately I will not be doing it justice here with what I’m about to write. If you’ve been keeping up with my life you will have heard that my trip with Luke switched hemisphere and I spent the holidays in New York and New England instead of in Latin America. It so happened that Luke’s flight down to Santiago coincided with the worst snow storm of the season on the east coast and all of his flights between Ohio and Miami had been canceled. With all flights lost that weekend (Dec. 20th), he wasn’t going to be able to reach Santiago until after Christmas. With tremendous help and generosity from my parents, I was able to get a flight from Santiago to JFK on December 23rd. I was treated to an amazing 2 weeks which I will tell about in my next post, but I wanted to say a bit about my trip to San Pedro de Atacama and Bolivia before I move on.

In the beginning of December I spent a 10 day trip with my friend Cora to Northern Chile and Western Bolivia. Our time was split between San Pedro de Atacama, Chile and a 4 day Jeep tour into the high plains and Salt Flats of Bolivia. I had been wanting to visit the salt flats since my time in Argentina two and a half years ago, so I felt really lucky to have finally made it there.

In San Pedro we stayed 5 nights in a camping ground, meeting interesting characters every day. The place offers many beautiful natural sites to visit, but the town itself is overridden with tourists and prices that you could mistake for those in the US. I felt like every local I met was an entrepreneur, trying to lure me into having them guide me along some tropical excursion I simply couldn’t miss out on. The campsite we were staying in seemed to be a breeding ground for these kinds of people. Right after they would explain to you how they’ve been sleeping in their tent and living ‘off the fruitful Atacama-land’ for the past 5 years, they would suddenly ask you about your plans during your stay…where have you been…where do you still want to visit…hey, we could go out together tomorrow! I’ll take you on the ‘alternative’ tour where no one else goes…I’ll even give you a discount, you just have to bring a six pack of beer for me and my buddy..the bullshit goes on, etc.

San Pedro did offer some beautiful sites and very enjoyable memories. There was a tranquility and desert silence that blanketed the town, making you fell instantly in vacation mode. Here’s some of the photos from this part of the trip

Bolivian parade, first night in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

We paid our guide in a 6 pack of Escudo

On the way to sandboarding

¡Salta!

Dunes of Valle de la Luna

Valle de la Luna

Valle de la Luna

Enjoyin' some 'cream en la calle

Comemorative picture with the owner of our hostel, a true huaso!

Lions at sunset in Laguna Cejar

"I went to the Chilean desert, and all I came back with was this lame perspective photot"

Sunset at Laguna Cejar

Floating in the Laguna Cejar (there is a heavy salt content which allows the 'Dead Sea' floating effect

The realization that you’ve crossed over from Chile into Bolivia is immediate.  It begins right at the boarder, when you notice that the immigration center is a small wooden shack in the middle of the desert, and all the rest follows: everything is 50 percent of the price, the people are darker, the running water and public bathrooms are much scarier and suddenly you find yourself sleeping at over 13,000 feet.  The 4 day Jeep trip I took into Bolivia cost a total of $141.00 USD, including food, water, nightly accommodations, nation park entry fees and a generally unforgettable experience.

For the first two days of the trip, we traveled through the Bolivian high plains, stopping at lagoons, rock formations, llama drumming circles, flamingo drag parties…basically non-stop exotic fun at extremely high altitudes.  We hit some sulfur geysers the first day that were at 16, 000 ft…needless to say, I was not feeling great.  To explain how I was affected by the altitude, I basically had a terrible headache for two days, but really nothing too bad.  We would chew coca leaves to relieve the pressure in our heads, a local treat for Bolivian tourists.  Though not the real drug, the leaves actually worked quite well…at killing my headache.

The second night, the eve of our arrival to Salar de Uyuni, we stayed in a hotel made of salt.  Really, it was entirely made of salt….the walls, the bed frames, the tables and chairs.  You could literally salt your dinner with the floor.  The next morning we woke up for sunrise and headed out towards the white horizon; we had reached the Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt flat.  The view on the flat was spectacular, feeling at the center of a supernatural landscape.  Being at the Salar really felt like that destination you’d been longing for after days of sever discomfort and fatigue.  No surprises here, this place was well worth an aching head.

¡Vaya Vaya! ¡Salta, Espejo!

We cut a deal with the vicuñas for this balanced pose

¿Qué hacen ellos?

My new friend...

More friends...Me, continuing to be a social butterfly

Arbol de Piedra: Dalí-esq no?

Hotel de Sal

Letters from Salar de Uyuni

Sunrise at the Hotel de Sal

Surfin' on the Salar

Penelope and Scarlet, the Mujeres de lujo, cathcing rays on Isla de Pescadores

This gal's happy to be here!

An ocean of salt

Las Minas de Sal

Penelope hits the fashonable shops in Uyuni

A 6 am stop at the thermal baths on the way home

3:30 am wake up call

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