January 14
OK – so we had 4:30 breakfast and 5am departure to catch the sunrise on the salt flats. Since it’s the rainy season, there is a few inches of water that has flooded the salt flats. We found out that on the 12,000 square kilometers of salt flats, the slope changes by no more than 60 centimeters. With the flooded flats, the ground acts like a mirror which allows for some cool pictures. We had a tough start to the day – our driver was 30 minutes late to leave since we were all a few minutes early, this gave me some major fomo. We made it to the flats in time for sunrise, but just barely and there was a lot of anxiety involved.
Find the horizon… I dare you:
Once the sun was up(ish) we tried a few perspective pictures. Some worked out really great!
And some turned out ok:
You see… Michael is supposed to be the golf ball on top of the tee…
And some not as good which I won’t post. I will say that it was harder than it looked
After pictures we headed to the hotel made of salt which was cool – it’s not in use anymore, but people congregate there and there are a bunch of foreign flags that people take pictures with. Here’s us with a slightly battered US flag:
And us showing love to Colombia and Mexico for some of our sobrinos:
After this we headed back to Uyuni to try to jump on a flight to La Paz. We were a little unprepared on how to get out of the city that night and we heard a rumor that some of the roads were shut down, so we waited not so patiently for a few hours and eventually made it onto the 2pm flight (at a cheaper price than many of the others who had bought months in advance, I might add). So we’re off to La Paz to try, once again, to get a Brazilian visa. Fingers crossed!!
One sad goodbye at that airport involved my trusty boots. We bout them for our hiking in Costa Rica for our honeymoon 6ish years ago. They have been a trusty through hikes in South and Central America and have been used to keep my feet dry for many Chicago snows. I noticed the soles were pulling away from the leather on the Inca Trail and standing in just a few inches of water today, my feet were soaked. So they were left in the airport bathroom. Thank you awesome boots – hopefully someone found you and will give you a second life!
The Salt Flats were beautiful, but we were pumped to get off that tour. Off to La Paz! One last picture and video for your viewing pleasure:
