The Salt Flats and the Altiplano

Holy shit, these past 4 days were quite something.  The first day was the Bolivian salt flats, the largest anywhere in the world.   There was about an inch of water everywhere, and it turned everything into a reflecting pool.  It made the whole thing look like a Salvador Dali painting.  The mountains in the distance looked like they were floating because the reflections were so still and perfect.  We got all sorts of really cool perspective photos including one where all of us were in a line and our reflections were perfectly still.

Then we had a lot of driving for the next while.  The scenery was amazing, but we'd spend all day driving, with only a few breaks which was really rough.  We did see some awesome stuff, including two lakes that were dramatic colors, and lots of interesting wildlife including llamas and flamingoes, but I got a wicked head cold and the bumpy roads made it impossible to do anything but stare out the window.  That got super boring after maybe the 8th hour...

That bheing said, there was some really amazing stuff.  The last thing we did was go to a train graveyard that had old steam trains up to modern ones.  I spent over an hour just walking around and taking pictures.  I really want to write a story set in a place like that.  They were just left there in the middle of this windy desert. It was just an unreal experience and I think it was a perfect end to this trip.

The next phase is a 1 AM train ride to an afternoon flight and then we arrive in the Bolivian rainforest for a 3 day canoe trip.  I'll be able to blog after that!