| South America 4 |
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| La Serena and the Elqui Valley La Serena is an untypical Chilean city (although it has a Plaza the Armas), with architecture that reminds more of north africa, with colorful houses and barred windows. Apart from a visit to the Archeological museum, which had a Eastern Island statue on display, and enjoying a night with some fellow travellers we didn�t do much. The next day the bus took us to Vicu�a, where we had a nights visit to an observatory Mamalluca, special for tourists. The amateur astronomer that guided us was very enthousiastic and we had an excellent night with incredibly clear skies. In this area of Chile there a many observatories including the newly built VLT (a european collaboration), which is supposed to be 50 times better than the Hubble telescope. Chile is the best place on the southern hemisphere, because of the clear air and the almost cloudless desert, where no substantial rain has been recorded in the last 100 years or more. After this we relaxed in a perfect and cheap hotel with swimming pool in the town of Pisco Elqui in the Elqui valley. Here the grapes a grown for the preparation of the most famous liquor in Chile: Pisco. A short tour around the local pisco company taught us the ins and outs of the preparation. The sweet grapes (high in sugar) are fermented twice to 15% and after that destilled to a quite nice drink, which of course we tasted well... The hotel was an absolutely perfect place for a party (wedding??), but since we couldn't invite all of you on such a short notice... The next stage of the trip was a long bustrip (several busses) from the Pisco Elqui Valley via La Serena and Calama (supposedly the driest place in the world, it has never rained) to San Pedro the Atacama. It was a shock to the system after having travelled in Chile without seeing too many fellow tourist to discover that San Pedro is a backpacker ants nest. It is a small village with muddy buildings which on the inside are transformed to nice restaurants and bars. Most people come to this barren, arid place to go to the highest geiserfield in the world (as they say) at 4,300 meters, or to the salt lakes (salars) of Atacama or Uyuni (Bolivia). For visiting the geiserfield at sunrise you have to get-up at the godforsaken hour of 3:30 AM, and sit in a fully packed van for 3 hours but don`t expect that you are alone there! The geiserfield was nice enough, although only one of the steamers was atually a geiser, but it was completely outperformed by the scenery on the way back: Snowy vulcanoes, red rock deserts sprinkled with cactusses, crossed by green gullies with some lamas. In the afternoon we went with almost the same group of people, but a little less crammed, to the Valley of the moon: Salty rocks and desert sands. This was the end for us in Chile, because we are taking a 3 day tour to the Salar of Uyuni in Bolivia, where we would be dropped off in the town of Uyuni. Bolivia, Salar de Uyuni tour We had great expectations of this tour and were not disappointed. Stupid tourists as we are we had been lured into a less well known touring company (we were warned, but still...) and that showed when we arrived at 4,300 meters at the Bolivian border to inspect our 4-wheel drive and guide. The guide turned out to be very cranky (possibly because he drove all night to get there in time and didn`t sleep at all, and the car was a bit small for 7 persons... With us on the trip were 2 brits (Claire and Andrew) and two French girls with the father of one of them. Typically only one spoke more than French and from here we understood that they expected a little more luxury, but more of that later... |
| The first day we drove up to about 5,000 meters high, past beautiful colored inactive vulcanoes (colors ranging from red, green, yellow to white) and mirror lakes of different colors (white saltlakes, a green (copper) lake and the last lake, the Laguna colorada of spectacular different colors red, white and yellow. Pink flamengo�s completed the postcard scene. We had only one mechanical failure underway, a carburator fillde with dust probably, which the guide/driver/cook solved by sucking out the gas with his mouth... This had a not all too good effect on his driving skills, he actually fell asleep and the car slipped of the road. Luckily there wasn't anything but sand about...Chewing half a bag of coca leaves apparently made him feel more awake and we continued without further in/accidents. We stopped for the night in our 'hotel' (as was promised to the frenchies), which consisted of a dumpy room with 3 double bunks, a camping bed and a table to eat from. Showers were nowhere in sight and the bathroom...well we won't spoil your dinner. The Frenchies exploded, they had been promised showers and separate rooms (haha), but instead they had to put up with us and the flea covered beds. While they discussed this with the cook/guide/driver we walked to the lake, very slowly because all of us were affected by the height. Shortness of breath, a splitting headache and dizzyness are the signs of altitude sickness, which can be cured by going to a lower altitude or chewing coca leaves (really multi-purpose stuff). Dinner was very welcome and not too bad according to the British/Dutch section, but the Frenchies, of course, didn't like it much... Needless to say we didn't sleep a lot that night. The next day we had an early breakfast outside in the sun and our guide seemed a bit more friendly (did his best anyway). We continued our journey past more mountains and lots of lakes with or without flamengo's. Only one 'maintenance' stop in a not so interesting place was necessary to keep the car going. Because of the dust we had to keep the windows closed and it was steaming hot. Our French friends, meanwhile, had a full time job covering their nose and mouth against the ten dust particles that had entered the car... For the second night the driver put us up in a much better place, including a shower (for which you had to pay extra). We slept better, but not for long: at 3:30 AM we left for the Saltflats of Uyuni to get there by sunrise. It was well worth it, the first part of the lake was still under 5 cm of water, which reflected the rising sun beautifully. After that it was one big flat white dessert, surrounded by mountains. In the middle is an 'island' covered with cactusses (up to 12 meters high and 1200 years old) where we had breakfast. At noon we were dropped of in Uyuni, a place full of rubbish except for the center. However the women in their colorful dress, selling their stuff on the market made up for the bad first impression, and we started to like this country... Potos�, mining city Together with Claire and Adrew we decided to escape Uyuni and take the nightbus to Potos�. This bus would arrive at 2 AM, but we were promised that we could continue to sleep in the bus (everybody does that). Since it is dark at 7 PM and there are no lights in these busses, there is nothing you can do except listen to the top ten Bolivian synthesizer songs, repeated every hour. At 10 the bus was filled with farmers from a village, women in local dress in the back, smelling very nicely (...) and men in the front. The trip was uneventful until the first pitsstop at 12 (no toilet in the bus...). After we got back in the nasty bus woman yelled through the door that all 'hombres' had to get out. We thought we were being punished and remained in our seats but after she practically pulled us out it turned out that we had to jump-start the bus! All the women had a fit of laughter (bonding ritual) while we successfully started the engine and were allowed back in. Continued on the next page |
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