Jayucota

A new day, another early start. We left the ghost town at 6 am hoping to beat the predicted wind and make it all the way to the town of Salinas de Garcia Mendoza, the closest village to the Salar de Uyuni.
After 3 windless hours of cycling it finally set in, a strong 5 bft headwind.
From then on it was slow going.

The scenery became more and more desert like and the route included quite a bit more climbing than what I would have liked. Not having slept too well the night before it was me this time who lobbied for an early stop.
After 75km we called it a day and looked for shelter in the tiny village ofJayucota, situated right next to a huge crater.
According to google maps and the signs in the village this is a Meteorite crater, but after consulting Wikipedia it turned out it was misidentified and actually caused by a vulcanic explosion when Lava/Magma hit a basin of water ☄️

The town didn't have much to offer except for the crater, a few houses and probably more basketball courts than people. In the end we found shelter in a (more or less) abandoned shepherd's hut behind the vilage, between some more old ruins.

The afternoon was spent walking around and into the crater, where the villagers cultivate fields of what I suspect is Quinoa and/or mais. During wet season there seems to be a lake inside the crater, but now it was more of a salty puddle. But at least there were still a few flamingos left!

We set up the tents inside the hut at nightfall and where happy to finally have some wind protection after a very windy day!

🚴‍♀️Distance cycled: 75/110 km
💧Amount of tiendas selling water in the village: 0
🦩Flamingos seen: 4
☄️ Meteorite craters: 0Read more