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A Life Less Ordinary

Tag: Uyuni

Two Otherworldly Highlights in Bolivia – Salar de Uyuni & Valle de las Rocas

Salar & Valle de las Rocas in Bolivia

Salar de Uyuni

Salar de Uyuni – or Salar de Tunupa (the local Quechua people prefer to call the area by its original name) – is located 20 minutes north of Uyuni and is the largest salt flat in the world. It measures 12,000 km2, which, to put it in perspective, is a bit over 1/3 the size of Belgium and four times the surface of Luxembourg. For Americans, Rhode Island fits three times into this Salar and Delaware twice – and New Jersey is twice as big.

(As always, click on or hover over photos in galleries to read their captions.)

Many overlanders prefer to drive and camp on this white, vast surface, usually stopping when they can’t see anything but salt around them. A trip on the salt flat with your own vehicle offers a lot of freedom, solitude, and fun, but it also requires protecting the undercarriage from all that destructive salt and giving it a detailed and thorough cleaning in the end. In the dry season. Once the wet season has started in Bolivia, taking your own home on wheels is a bad idea, because the (wet) salt will get anywhere and destroy everything it touches, over time. Plus, some parts of this area are closed when (too) wet.

Reflection pool on the salt flat

With that in mind, Mark, Maya, and I booked a tour for the day. Even better, we arranged a private excursion for our little family to give Maya (who was recovering from a nasty dog bite) enough comfort and space, and to allow us the privacy and freedom of a trip tailored to just the three of us. We could tell our guide wherever we wanted to go on the Salar, what to skip or limit, and whenever we wanted to move on. And, to be honest, at twice the price of a group tour ($120 for the three of us instead of $60), we believed it was worth the splurge. 😊

Our tour started at 10:30am, would finish after sunset, around 8pm, and included lunch and drinks. We decided to skip stop one (the Train Cemetery where we had been living, exploring, and photographing for four days already) and made stop two (salt processing tour and artisanal markets) shorter, for an earlier start on the Salar. A massive rain storm was threatening, so I wanted to stay ahead of that!

Once on the salt flat, the fun could begin! We stopped by the Ojos de Agua, which our Spanish-speaking guide, Eusevio, called the “breath” of the Salar. Water bubbled up from below, as if something was breathing under the surface.

He encouraged us to employ a local guy to take “forced perspective” photos of us and Maya. Since that was affordable, we obliged.

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Overlanding and Dog Challenges in Bolivia (Early 2024)

Once in a while, I offer a glimpse behind the scenes of our nomadic lifestyle. Yes, I do often write about the ups and downs of life on the road, but rarely in detail. If you’ve been following along for a while – or read my memoir, Plunge – you know that I aim to present a realistic image of being perpetual travelers.

Let’s pick up where I left off in January: departing the Las Lomas Campground in La Paz after running the place and being stationary there for one month. It was a nice break that let us catch our breaths from the challenges of the road, but it brought (unexpected) consequences, namely an array of road blocks, the start of rainy season, and a dog attack.

Road blocks are “a thing” in Bolivia, meaning they are quite common and often related to the political situation involving ex-president Evo Morales. I just finished reading a great memoir by fellow overlander and virtual friend Mary Hollendoner, called Monkeys on the Road, in which she describes being stuck in what almost became a Bolivian revolution in 2019! Interestingly, this happened while she was camped at Las Lomas Campground. Their plans in this country were affected as well.

Ironically, this latest set of road blocks started on January 22nd, which was Plurinational State Foundation Day, a newish holiday initiated in 2009 to celebrate Bolivia’s multi-ethnic identity. That’s when the indigenous people started their political protests. Our next destination was the constitutional capital and World Heritage Site of Sucre, but access was impossible.

These road blocks popped up while we were still camped in La Paz

Mark and I gave it a few more days in La Paz and then left to a split in the road further south, near Oruro, where we camped for another two nights at Sora Sora. Based on the roadblock situation, we could drive to Sucre from there, or skip the town and head to Uyuni, where its salt flats are the highlight of Bolivia.

But first, we needed gasoline for Thirsty Bella. The Bolivian government makes it difficult for foreigners to fill up their tanks, as fuel stations need special systems and paperwork to make that happen. Plus, the price for non-Bolivians is more than twice what it is for locals. We believed using a jerry can circumvents some of these issues, but it sure is a hassle to get gasoline this way. Yet, that would be our approach.

My travel companion in Bolivia

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