Uyuni

Maybe Uyuni wasn't the best choice as the first city in Bolivia. Just like in San Pedro de Atacama, there has been a rapid tourism boom here, which means there are a lot of uninspiring tour operators. Various pickpockets naturally prefer to target tourists with dollars in their wallets, so be cautious!

Now let's get to the reason why there are so many tourists here: the 12,000 km2 salt flat. You can even drive on it with your own car. However, the region was hit by heavy rains in January/February, which isn't ideal for a desert. The surface of the flat is dome-shaped, so there is still water standing about 10 cm high at the edges of the salt flat. The police only allow access to the salt flat for 4x4 SUVs, which doesn't apply to our beat-up cars. But we probably wouldn't have gone anyway because at the beginning, you have to drive through highly concentrated saltwater.

We're still traveling with Benni and Bettina, and while one of us has been watching the cars, the others have been gathering information about tours. There are 1, 2, or 3-day tours. After a long search, we got a custom offer. A tour through the salt flat to the volcano, driving up the volcano, and going back to Uyuni via the island in the salt flat. This offer allowed us to get away from the tourist crowds.

The next day, we were off. As mentioned before, the salt flat is still quite wet, so our driver could only drive at about 20 km/h, and when even Bolivian drivers do that, you know it's necessary.

We checked off the tourist must-dos by passing the Dakar Rally monument, the salt hotel, and the salt mountains. Then we drove through the salt for another 2 hours to the other end of the salt flat. Our driver took his time to explain everything to us. The waterholes in the salt flat that form salt pyramids and salt crystals were especially interesting.

After a night in the salt hotel, we went up the volcano to visit the mummies. Unfortunately, they weren't quite what we had imagined ;-) When the king died, they simply put him in a cave, and that's where they still sit today. Yeah, it was creepy.

The next item on the agenda was visiting the island located in the center of the salt flat. There are cacti here that grow up to 12 meters high. After a breathtaking sunset, we headed back to Uyuni.