Uyuni II - Are We Still On Planet Earth?

The second day on our Uyuni tour brought us beyond the white salt flats and deeper into the high-altitude desert that lies behind it. Even though we made loads of stops, it would turn out to be a long day with the majority of it in the car as we had a huge distance to cover.

Anyway, our very first stop of the day was at a quite bizarre place when you try to imagine it.
We got out of the car and around us were weirdly-looking and quite sharp rocks. Our guide told us that those used to be corals ages ago. I mean, excuse me? We are above 4000m and you are telling me that there were fish swimming around here? Wow. That was the last thing I would have thought of these rocks.

With that fact to contemplate, we continued our tour into another salt flat. This one, though, was much smaller, less white and not as impressive as the one yesterday. Nevertheless, we stopped pretty much in the middle of it where there happened to be train tracks to transport salt from here into town some decades ago. Turned out train tracks in the middle of literally nowhere do provide an excellent opportunity to take pictures.

Next up was a viewpoint that gave us a glimpse of an active volcano in the background. We could see some smoke coming out, which very much reminded me of Volcan Fuego in Antigua, Guatemala. Maria, who grew up there, only slightly agreed and quickly pointed out that the one in Antigua is much more impressive. Okay, I agree, she has a point. But this volcano was cute, too. The other thing to see there were some rocks covered in sort of green coating - our guide explained it to us, but maybe I was too fascinated by the volcano, so I don't quite remember what the green stuff was. Lastly, we had some very delicious llama sausage. It was super yummy - don't judge me for eating it, it was impossible to resist!

Continuing our tour, the following stop was to check out some lakes which were home to hundreds of beautifully pinkish flamingos. They looked quite elegant wading through the outskirts of the lake looking for food. This picture was perfectly complemented with some quite rare Vincuñas (sort of llama basically) and a rugged mountain landscape in the background. Truly a gorgeous site.

After a decent lunch with views over the lakes/flamingos, we drove to see the chinchillas, which are huge squirrels or very cute rabbits - depending on your view. They were not shy at all as we approached them with some nuts. They still live in their natural habitat and it is quite remarkable given that nothing really grows in that part of the desert. True survivors.

With two stops left, the second-to-last location was a bunch of beautifully shaped rocks. It was very windy at that stop, so we took some nice pics before hurriedly going back into the warm car.

Our ultimate stop was maybe among the most beautiful scenery I have seen in a long time. Yes, it was another lake with flamingos and mountains in the background, but the lake and its surroundings were covered in all sorts of colours. It literally looked as if god used that part of the world as a paint box for the rest of the world. As if he dipped his brush in that lake to bring colour to the world. It was simply incredible. To make things even more ridiculously beautiful, the sun was setting to our right, dipping the lake and its colours into a warm light.

The day was amazing. The landscape really was something from another planet and it is hard to believe that places like this exist on earth. These were my thoughts. And all of that in one day. Add the white salt flats from yesterday and this whole area becomes even more mind-blowing! Really could not wait what the last day would have in store for us.Read more