Bolivian Heights

Hola amigos!

How do you like our new Bolivian hats?!

We realize that's it's been a while since we've updated our web log here, but it's not for a lack of trying. You see, we have been traveling around Bolivia for a few weeks now, but have had a hard time connecting to the internet. It turns out that Bolivia isn't connected like we're used to. However, that doesn't mean we're complaining. We have had a lot of fun in this country.

Just after crossing the border into Bolivia, the first thing we saw was a wonderfully welcoming sign. Second thing, streetside billiards tables.

Not wanting to waste any time, we immediately booked a tour of the famous Uyuni Salt Flat for the following morning. The tour was four days and three nights of riding around some of the most scenic parts of the Bolivian Altiplano (high plains).

On our first day, we encountered what looked like a dried up lake of white powder. Though it looks like it may be salt, it is actually Borax, a base component of detergent. It's been a while since I've done some heavy duty work, so I thought I might get my hands dirty, or clean rather.
Before I go too much further with the tour, I must introduce the rest of our tour group, who were a lot of fun to be cramped into a car for 6 to 8 hours a day with. From right to left, Ramon, Angel, and Miguel, hailing from Madrid, Spain.

They provided a constant source of humor and fun that lasted the whole tour. Any time we stopped for photos, these guys were goofing around in some fashion. Below, Ramon had decided to become one with this plant, only to find out later that it had a bit of sap on it.

Here, Miguel thought he might help our driver unload the car, but instead struck a pose that we became extremely familiar with over our four days. For whatever reason, he really likes to extend his arms in his photos. I think it really works for him.

And here, rising from the bubbles of a geyser, Angel ignored the spray from a very active pool of boiling mud.

Angel was an extremely useful guy to have around on this tour. He had a very special watch that indicates the altitude of his location at any given moment. Here's a peek at his altimeter around the geysers that we visited.

And that reading is in meters. Equating to 16,437 feet. The air was a bit thin up there.

Though impressive, geysers aren't completely new to Laura and I, as we have both been to Yellowstone National Park, so we spent only a few minutes outside of the car in the cold. The Spaniards, however, were absolutely enthralled by the steam. They must have spent a half an hour wandering around taking silly photos. They really were a constant source of entertainment.

Below is a shot of our trusty driver/guide Samuel. He is doing a condor pose for this photo. He was also a lot of fun, and also really good at changing a tire. It was amazing that we didn't blow more than one tire, with all of the extremely rocky roads.

And finally, perhaps the most important person on our tour, our cook Marisol. Yeah, that's right. We were provided with a cook who rode along with us! She was a really sweet Bolivian woman who had to put up with a lot of hungry males.

Marisol made us wonderfully delicious foods, like the tamales filled with llama meat.

Sometimes our meals were eaten right out of the back of the truck, tailgate style. Sometimes we had a picnic on a stone table. But always, the food was delicious!

Marisol and Samuel sat in front and a big bag of coca leaves was often set between them. It was amazing how many coca leaves Samuel could fit into his mouth. The locals chew the leaves with a bit of ash to activate the enzymes that help with the effects of high altitude. Everyone in our group got to try some. Our cheeks went numb. Apparently the locals don't have this problem as they are used to it. We felt like rookies.

Our tour took us through beautiful little villages and through gorgeous high altitude scenery. We just bumped around in the back of the jeep, listening to way too much traditional Bolivian music. The Spaniards learned the words to some of the songs (not difficult to do) and sang along in high pitched voices. Below is a photo of some of that beautiful scenery I mentioned. This lake is aptly named Laguna Verde (green lake).

More beautiful scenes with mirror like reflections in the still waters.
Weird rock formations were also a feature of our tour.

One really cool thing we saw was Laguna Colorada (colored lake). Yes, it is red. Apparently this is due to some sort of algae that grows in the water. It was surreal.

The photos don't exactly do the lake's color justice. It was very red.

We were dropped off on one part of the lake and were able to hike along its shore before being picked up again. We were thrilled to see that llamas were also on the shore. The colored tassels in their ear helps to identify who they belong to. It also happens to make them look very cute!

At Laguna Colorada, we had a bit of a llama roundup. This was not the first time our group had tried unsuccessfully to get right up by them.

The baby llamas were the cutest. We liked this speckled one a great deal. It didn't run away.

Other frequently seen wildlife on the tour was a cousin of the llama- the vicuna. While llamas are domesticated, vicunas are wild. They also have issues with humans coming close to them. The photo below shows them running away from us after an attempted vicuna roundup.
What else did we see? Flamingos! I have always associated flamingos with warm weather and Florida. I now know better. It is amazing that any of these animals thrive in such a harsh environment. It is cold at 16,000ft!

As we worked our way through this incredible scenery and past all of this wildlife, we had a much welcome soak in some thermal baths. It felt very nice, although the water had to have been pretty dirty since I know for a fact none of us had shower facilities the night before. The lodging for the first two nights was very modest. Mud brick buildings. No heat. No hot water. Marisol had her own kitchen/bedroom. Our group was in a dorm room. Luckily, there were plenty of blankets!

On our final night, we had an upgrade: we stayed in a salt hotel located about 10 minutes from the flat. Due to the ecological impact, people can no longer stay in the hotel that is physically on the flat. It is now a museum. Yes, the building is made entirely of salt blocks. Even the furniture and flooring were salt. It was one of the more unique places we have stayed in our trip. As you can see, the dining room was tastefully decorated with a flamingo carcass. Class all the way, baby!

Day four of our trip was the grand finale. We woke up very early to watch the sunrise on the salt flat. It was worth it!

We had fun playing with the sun as it made its appearance.

Because it is impossible to judge distance on the flats, you can take some pretty fun photos.

Besides being an amazing tourist attraction, the salt from the flats is a commodity. It is extracted and sold. Here you can see mountains of it being piled into the truck.

People live on the edges of the flat and these children, like children anywhere in the world, liked to splash in the puddles of water near their village.
It was an amazing tour with a really good group of people. Thanks for sharing the experience with us, chicos!

(And thanks for letting us use some of your photos, chicos!)

Camino de Vino

Staying still in BA for so long was a refreshing experience, but we're on the move regularly again.

After the falls, we headed in the direction of our next country, Bolivia, but that doesn't mean we were totally finished with Argentina. Just a few more cities to hit.

Next stop: Salta. Above is a picture of one of the many churches that are scattered around the city of Salta. The city is surrounded by mountains which offered some great views if you were willing to climb up nearby hills. We weren't exactly interested in a very big hike, but luckily for us, they have gondolas that you can ride to the top of the closest hill for a very cheap rate. Yeah, we skipped the exercise, but we're up in some elevation here. You get winded pretty easily. Don't judge us. We walked down to make up for it.

From the top, you could see the entire city, and beyond. It was a good view. We don't really have much of an excuse, but we weren't really feeling the vibe of Salta, so this is about the only touristy thing we did in the place, although there were options.

On the walk back down the hill, we stumbled upon a pretty cool monument of this Argentine hero. I can't remember exactly who he is, but he's a pretty big deal. This monument has made me rethink my memorial that I had previously requested.

Maybe the coolest thing that happened while we were in Salta was a roadside concert that we literally stumbled upon. This was in the middle of the street right next to the central plaza, and turned out to be a pretty big deal. There were a few different groups that played, and it was being recorded to be shown on TV over the weekend. The reason we thought it was a big deal was because after watching this group, we saw posters of the girl in white on the walls of a few bars, looking like a known singer.

After this group, we were able to catch a pretty entertaining group of four men playing some of the folkloric music of the region. They were really exciting to watch, but because I was too preoccupied with recording the performance on video, I forgot to snap a pic of them.

After Salta, we took a trip a little farther north to Tilcara. This was a small town, population 2,000, surrounded by mountains. Immediately after getting off of the bus, we noticed that the climate was beginning to change as we moved higher in the atmosphere. The air was much drier, and the temperature was much cooler.

We were also surprised by the similarity of Tilcara to the likes of Arizona. It was very desert like. Could be hot during the day, and very cold at night. Not quite freezing, but a shock to us, nonetheless.

The next day, we took a bus to a nearby town, Purmamarca. This town has an especially colorful mountainside. It is called the hill of seven colors, but we think that there were actually a few more shades than just seven.

Once we got closer, we tried to count them. Once you get past all the shades of purple, and start counting the oranges and greens, there really are quite a few more colors.

Below, we decided to take a hike around the back and see what else there was. There was a lot of really cool rock formations and excellent views. And it was super windy, hence, the awesome hair.

We met a few geologists in our hostel that indicated to us exactly how interesting the rock formations and mountains are in this part of the world. They were from Arizona and made it sound like this place was the Holy Grail of geology research, so it's a pretty big deal. There was a lot of talk of fault lines and rocks and other stuff that I stopped listening to. But I came away appreciating the region a bit more.

After the hike, we did some strolling around the market. As we get closer to Bolivia, we are seeing a lot of really cool tapestries and textiles. There's also a lot of fun hats, bags, and table cloths. Llamas are featured heavily in the works.

Tilcara is a pretty small place, but there were a few short hikes that we decided to go on. We weren't expecting it, but as I mentioned before, there are a lot of cacti in this part of the country.

The following day, we took a hike to a hill called the "Pucara". It is basically a vantage point, and strategic lookout/fort that the indigenous people of the town used to see enemies approaching. It's entirely reconstructed to look like what it may have many years ago before the modern world encroached, and below is the church.

We stayed awhile at the top, and enjoyed a bit of tea. In the distance, just beside Laura's face is the neighboring town, a few kilometers away

If you happened to notice a black dog in the photo of the church, it wasn't exactly just a dog that happened to also be on the Pucara. This is the dog that became our guide for the day at her own volition.

It all started within the town, where this seemingly stray dog approached us for a sniff. We thought that it would end there, but she began walking with us, and never stopped. We named her Muri because she is black like a murcielago(Bat). Once she got a name, we decided we liked her, and made her pose for a few pictures.

She even snuck into the restaurant that we later had lunch in, and we hid her under the table so that she wouldn't get kicked out. She lasted most of the meal, but when another dog barked just outside the window, she scrambled out from under the table making quite a bit of noise, exposing us. When we left, she was waiting outside and followed us home, where we had to part ways.

The reason I mention our guide dog is because it wasn't the first time this happened in this town. The previous day, when we began our hike around town, this dog below decided to be our guide. It was a bit ironic that it happened two days in a row. This guy, who picked us up in the central plaza, was not as well liked as Muri, because at the end of our hike, he decided to sniff a pile of horse poo, and then proceed to roll in it.

And since we're on the subject of ugly dogs, I did like the one below. Sometimes they make you smile and laugh because they are so ugly.

More dogs. We were hoping this dog that lived across the street from our hostel would want to be our guide for a day, but he didn't seem up for it.

Another little excursion we decided to go on was to another neighboring town, Maimara, where we heard there was a winery. Well, after a short cab ride, we first checked out a few lookout points.

The views were similarly excellent with a colorful mountainside.

After we had enough of staring at the landscape, we headed into town, and began following signs to where the winery was located. We were told that it was a short walk, and even found a sign that said it was 1000 meters away, but after walking for what seemed like half an hour, we felt duped. I know it doesn't take that long to walk 1 kilometer.

Anyway, along the path we saw some farms, and some burros. Really, any type of animal excites us. This guy even brayed for us.

We finally made it to the winery, walked up to a building that looked like a store, and found nobody in it. Great. We did, however, see a man trimming weeds at the entrance, who located someone else to sell us some wine.

Well, the man he called over(blue sweater) saw we came a long way, and offered to show us around. Our own personal 15 minute tour. It was small enough that we were able to see everything in that time frame.
There was something ironic about cacti in the middle of grape vines that was a bit surprising to us.

Here are the tanks, five in all. They also had 18 barrels aging. A really small operation overall.

It was a pretty cool location for a winery, nestled up against the mountainside.

After the tour, and after we bought 2 bottles of wine, we felt a little bit bitter about the fact that we had walked so far to get to the winery, and in the direction of Tilcara, where we were staying. We felt like we backtracked enough that it wasn't worth it to walk the opposite direction into Maimara to get a cab to Tilcara. We were originally told that this winery was around 8 kilometers away from our hostel, so we asked our trusty tour guide if it was possible to walk back. His lack of surprise made us feel like it would be no big deal to do. So he directed us to just walk up that mountainside, and keep heading in that direction.

Here's Laura holding our prize with the winery in the background.

So below, I'm now posing with some wine. This was maybe a half an hour into our grand plan, which we were beginning to doubt more and more because we couldn't actually see Tilcara. We just kept walking along a ridge in the direction that we thought we should be going.
More walking, unsure if there was actually a trail here. Every once in a while we spotted what looked like paw prints, or a trail marker, so we just kept on. Below, the winery is no longer in view, and neither is our destination. After about an hour and a half now, we are starting to wonder why we thought this was a good idea.

Two hours after departing it looks like we actually stumbled upon something. Maybe it's Tilcara? Laura is doing a little scouting for us, and it looks like there is no way down. So we did some backtracking and found a fairly steep path down that wasn't really a path, but we were fed up with losing the trail, so we slowly descended along boulders and cacti. The last stretch was definitely not any fun, but the adventure made the wine taste a whole lot better!
And thus ends our Camino de Vino!