Since the epoch of my trip plannning, the Salar de Uyuni, or Salt Flat of Uyuni was one of the places that I was looking forward to the most.

Ever since I saw the picture of salt piled up on the lake, I knew it was somewhere that I had to go on my trip.  There was a little bit of contention of even going to Bolivia at all because of the $135 gringo fee and the political issues with the US.  The allure of seeing the salt flats was a significant factor in why I made my decision to “take the risk”, however perceptable it may have been.

Getting to Uyuni was a signifcant undertaking.  As the last post talked about, we had to cut through massive road blocks.  About 100km after Oruro the pavement ended.  I would not see any pavement OR even a street sign for the next 5 days.

The road to Uyuni was pretty clear.  The first 15km was very rough as it was a bypass of the gravel road with a pure sand road.

Neither Theo nor I dropped the bike but it was only because we were being very careful in not wanting to test the local medical system.

The road to Uyuni was absolutely beautiful.  It was a mixture of desert with river valleys so you’d be driving through kms of sand and scrub then all of a sudden there would be a grassy field.  I love Bolivia!

With the road you had two choices.  If you stayed in the middle of the road it was washboard or heavy corrugation.  Uhg.  At low speeds you’re just asking alot from your suspension.  If you go fast enough to gently clip the tops of the washboard to get a smooth ride you had the opportunity to meet only other component of the road:  deep sand.

As a result, we forced to take it easy.  It was 200km of roads like this and it took us all day.  The jeeps, which would periodically pass us at an insanely fast rate, took only 4 hours.

We had lunch with some flamencos.  It was amazing.  This was one of the most remote places I’ve visited in my entire life and it really felt like it.  There were almost no other people and everything felt exotic.  This is my first non-zoo flamenco experience!

The skies were just screaming to be photographed.  Most of the pics in this report are Theo’s, visit his website and check out his “emotionals”.  They’re a bit odd in google translation, but they work.

Thanks Theo for taking this amazing picture.  I think I’m going to print it out when I get home for my office wall.  Yeah, in thinking of what life is going to be like when I return to work, seeing this photo will bring me back to exactly where I want to be.

Uyuni was kind of a dumpy desert town.  There were a few nice streets, but here at the oil change place, they just dump the oil all over the sand.  Thanks guys.

We spent the night at a good hotel as our reward for 8 hours of offroading.  The basin of the shower was brown with sand and dirt.  It was a great day.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally, what I had been waiting for my whole trip.  The Salar de Uyuni is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen.  It is a completely flat plain of whiteness.  It goes on miles and miles for all directions.  Other people describe it like being on another planet.  For me, seeing the salt flat was accomplishing one of the dreams of my trip.  What another great day.

Once we got to the Salar de Uyuni, we realized we weren’t the only bikes there.

I was able to get my picture!

Here is the rallye sticker for the Fench bikers.  They were so great to meet!

We stopped at an island in the middle of the salt flat that naturally had a restaurant.  Here I left a couple of the Bolivian 4×4 guides sit on my bike and take pictures.

Not me either.

This french guy used a bread basket and napkin to get out of the salar’s intense sun.

We made 45 new friends with frenchmen who  flew their bikes over to ride from Santiago to La Paz on thier new BMW 1200 GS Adventures.  Wow.  It was quite a sight.  I felt like I was in the middle of some TV commercial.  I saw more GSes in one day in the middle of Bolivia as I did my entire life in the United States.

The graitious standing on the pegs on perfectly smooth salt photo.

The next that follow is the game that everyone places on the Salar de Uyuni.  Because it is so perfectly flat you can really mess with perception and depth.  For about 3 hours we procede to try to stand on top of everything we had.

OK.  Enough of that.

No really.

Now we’re just back to bikes on the salt flat.  No more tiny people.

Did I mention I’m happy to be here?

We left the salt flats and were trying to find a cheap hotel.  That isn’t as easy as it sounds, even though we’re in Bolivia.  We didn’t want to drive back to Uyuni (about 30 minutes away).  We tried the hotels that the French Bikers were staying at, but they were 4 star hotels and we couldn’t even come close to affording that.

After learning that we didn’t have the money to stay in a room at the hotel, one french guy started insisting to the front desk that we were elite BMW mechanics who helped fix the rallye bikes.  We were then permitted to sleep in the hamocs of a 4 star hotel.  this is my first 4 star hammoking.

The entire hotel was made of salt.  Pure salty luxary.  Even the floor was salt granuales.  Kinda like visiting the beach, but even more salty.

This was truely a unique experience.

They had a few support vehicles.  It must have been nice to have fresh tires constantly!!

Here is what some of the other salt flats look like.  Most of the ones in Bolivia and Chile aren’t the solid salt flats what you are thinking about.  They’re these salty crusty dried mud places devoid of life.

I’m still happy to be here too.

After leaving the Salar de Uyuni, we were constantly lost, even with GPS loaded with maps.  The problem was that none of the maps that we bought or brought or were loaded on GPS reflected reality.  We could use the names of cities we read on maps to ask the people working their alpaca for a direction, but none of the roads were where they were supposed to be nor even the orders of cities.  We were navigating blind.

The first day we found a hostel that would let us park in their restaurant.  They had pretty good llama too.

Another salt flat…

The ride to Chile was as challenging as the road to Uyuni.  Atleast there were a couple of times whee we were on rock roads high above the salars.

We saw this mine in the distance and went through their perimeter gate to ask them for directions.  They were super nice and told us they were mining sulfur.

We eventually made it to the Chilean border after a tough couple of days of riding.  Bolivia was a great experience.  I’m so happy I made it in.