Hola Amigos from Uyuni...

So I left you with the plot of the movie on the bus and we had just departed La Paz... anyway we continued on and I slept on and off for awhile.. The bus departed at 7 I think it was.. at about 3am we stopped... and we didn't start back up again... there have been a lot of road blocks in Bolivia as this is how the locals protest, there were the one between Copacabana and La Paz over the rd through the Amazon, and now another one.. This one we learn later is because of a silver mine in between two states of Bolivia as they can't decide who it belongs to.. And the president won't help as he is from one state and has a strong following in the other.. So naturally a road block is put in place to fix this.. Not sure what it achieves.. I guess it stuffs up tourism which Bolivia rely on so much and in turn can be quite effective.. I just find it annoying as my tour departs Uyuni at 11am.. Anyway 3 hours later we start back up and get let through.. Again annoying.. This means new arrival time into Uyuni is about 10am.. Still a chance to make the tour.. We rove for about another hour and bang... stopped again.. Goodbye salt flats tour.. 3 hours we stopped here as well.. Good fun. This one wasn't as bad as I slept most of it and we could get out if we wanted as it was dawn.. But I just stayed on and slept. 3 hours later we moved on and arrived to Salta about 12:30.. Good fun.. We got off the bus and Charlie negotiated a hostel as I now had to find somewhere to stay.. The Belgium guys jumped straight on a salt flats tour that was waiting for them and the Israeli disappeared.. We got a bed each for like $3 so was pretty happy about that.. After we dumped our stuff we headed out for food... found an Italian type place and enjoyed first food in nearly 24 hours.. whilst eating we met an American couple who were arguing over where to eat so we interrupted and suggested the place we were at as the beer was cold and the food looked good.. They took us up on our recommendation.. They told us their horror story of being delayed and taking 32 hours.. Double what we did.. They left the night before us and only got in 9 hours before us.. We felt better about our 6 hour delay.. Then a group of kiwis came and sat down we got chatting to them as well. There were 4 of them to.. We were all swapping sth American horror stories and also stories of ppl we had met. We also chatted about what we were doing etc.. After lunch I went to the internet to let bamba, the company organising my buses know that I missed the tour and also that I will be on the next day.. So my bus schedule after the salt flats had changed slightly.. The rest of the group went and booked a tour..

After awhile I went back to the hostel and had a snooze and then ventured out for some dinner.. I ran into the kiwis so ate with them.. I met two Danish girls who were going to be on y tour so that was good to know there were some people my age on my tour.. There bus was really late as well from La Paz and got stuck in the salt flats as it tried to detour..The military had to come and help them and everything.. Epic fail..

After dinner was time to call it a night.. In the morning woke up and packed up.. Met back up with Charlie and I gave him a bit of vegemite as I still had a full tube (remember this) so he shouted me breakfast as a massive thank you as he was like a kid in a candy store. We had breakfast and then headed to our separate tour companies.. I dropped my stuff off and they went and got a drink.. When I went I ran into Vicki and Jackie chatted to them briefly and they were looking for a tour company so we walked back to my agency and they booked for the next day.. Shattered they couldn't get on our tour though. Anyway 11am rolled around and we started to load up the 4WD's and then headed off

The first stop on the tour was the train graveyard.. This is where the first trains in Bolivia are sitting and rusting. They were first bought to replace donkeys in transporting goods between cities. The train graveyard was cool, a lot had been grafitied and were all rusted out. They were steam trains so rain on coal. We climbed all over them taking stupid pics.. And then I got stuck... we climbed to the top of a train and then I remembered I am scared of heights and froze.. My group who I will introduce next found this rather amusing and after taking a few pics of m stuck on a side of a rusted train they decided to help me down... I learnt a valuable lesson this day.. Never listen to the Dutch haha.

So my group was 11 people in 2 4WD's in my car there were the Dutch couple Stephanie and Alex.. Great couple who have been married a year however it was Alex who lead me a stray on the way down from the train.. This becomes a joke of the trip not to trust the Dutch. I was also in a car with the two Danish girls Rikke and Louise. We had the black 4 wheel drive and had a great time when cruising through the desert in our car.

The other car were 6 people- 2 English girls residing in US Vien and Sheena, a Swedish couple Emma and Thomas and an older German couple the wife's name is Ena and the husbands I never could remember as it was not a common name at all. Everyone got on really well.

After the train graveyard we headed to a salt hotel on the outskirts of the salt flats for lunch. Great Apple Pie. The salt hotel was pretty awesome made out of salt bricks and it has salt sculptures. After lunch we headed into the salt flats and learnt how they were formed.. It was from volcanoes I think and the extreme temperatures.. But whatever the cause they are the world's largest salt flats and Neil Armstrong noticed them when they first went to the moon and took photos of them. We learnt about how they transfer it into table salt and how they farm the salt.

After this we went to the only salt flat hotel that allowed in the salt flats. After this we did the funny photos so I was attacked by a dinosaur, my vegemite and also kicked Alex.. It was good fun. After the photos we went to Cactus Island which is a random island in the middle of the salt flats covered in cactus. And then we went and watched the sunset from the middle of the salt flats and took some more photos. After this it was to the hotel which was a salt hotel for some food and rest. We had dinner and got to know each other around the dinner table. Heard everyone's story and what they were doing... after dinner it was bed time. I roomed with Sheena and vien the English girls who were good value. In the morning we got up and headed off again.. Today we saw volcanoes, flamingos, red lakes and green lakes.. It was amazing the desert was hot and the scenery was beautiful, we also saw the lava tree.

I was feeling pretty crap as were half the group as we believe it is from some dodgy chicken from the night before. By the middle of the day we started feeling a bit better but were not 100%. After a full day of sightseeing we headed in for dinner and sleep to a hostel I roomed with the girls again and it was freezing.. Eventually warmed up and had a decent night's sleep..

The last day of the tour we were up at 4am and off to see the sun rise from the middle of a crater of an active volcano.. It was pretty amazing.. The mud pools bubbled as the steam rose from the craters.. The sun came up and it was an amazing sight. After the sun rise we went about another half hour to the hot springs.. Here we bathed in 38 degree water over looking volcanoes and lakes.. It was amazing.. We then had breakfast and headed off to the boarder of Bolivia and Chile.. When we got to the boarder the Danish girls, me and the German couple all said goodbye to the rest of our group and waited at the boarder for our transfer to San Pedro In Chile.. tour was over.. was good fun and sad to say goodbye to the group..

Next stop quick trip in Chile...