I took an overnight bus from La Paz to Uyuni. Once out of La Paz there are no roads as such through the desert so it was a bumpy ride but I managed to sleep almost all the way. Apparently the bus stopped several times. I was grateful I took the tourist bus and not the cheaper local bus which had an accident on route and was unable to continue its journey!
Uyuni is a tourist town in the middle of nowhere and does not have much going for it but it is a place where you can start a three day trip in a jeep across the salt lakes and desert to the Chilean border. Myself and a couple from South Africa who I had met on the Dragoman trip had booked the trip in La Paz but when we got to Uyuni we were told we had to pay more due to increases in fuel prices. Fuel in Bolivia had been kept at a low price but the Bolivian government had just realised that people were selling fuel at the Peruvian border for double the price so they had doubled the price overnight. As you can imagine there was uproar regarding this and as we left Uyuni the rest of the country was about to come to a standstill with road blockages and protests. It was pretty bad and went on for ages until the government reversed its decision! Lucky we got to Uyuni when we did, had we have been a day later we would have been in trouble. We were also asked to pay a fee for our passports to be stamped which I was told was not normal but hell were any of us going to argue with the border control guys. It was not much and clearly it was going straight into their pockets but hey, that´s Bolivia and is to be expected.
Initially it was a hot ride under a relentless sun and a dusty landscape, stopping at various points to take photo´s such as the redundant train lines, an island of Cacti, the amazing salt lakes and a disused salt hotel!. The tour included very basic accomodation and food which our driver cooked on route.
The 2nd part of the journey took us high up over volcanoes and mountains passing some amazing scenery including lakes with grazing flamingos, the famous landscape painted by Salvador Dahli, Thermal springs and geysers. The 2nd night was just a bed to lay your head, no running water atall....thank god for baby wipes and hand sanitizer! Outide of the building the wind was incredible and it was so cold, we were now back in hats, scarves and gloves. The stars however were phenomenal this far away from any other civilization! During the journey we visited and stayed at a few villages. Dont ask me how the few people that live out there in that harsh environment, maybe that is why they seemed less friendly.
In my opinion Bolivia is unique, the people are ´tough´ but I guess they have to be. Tourism is carried out but not all that well sometimes but when you think about it, in the first world you can do a degree in tourism but many Bolivians do not have much of an education atall, let alone the option to specialise in looking after the gringo´s! And why should they care, they are just trying to make ends meet and feed their families! Many gringo´s fall in love with Bolivia none the less and probably for these reasons.
No comments:
Post a Comment