After the Salar de Uyuni salt flats we quested out to explore SW Bolivia to an extent I didn’t expect. This “mostly driving” tour took us to so many unexpected environmental spots: salt flat lakes, eroded sandstone boulders, flamingos at 15.000 ft, colorful rainbow mountains with pastel flood planes that look like paintings, chinchilla-like animals, volanic outcroppings that are wind eroded in the middle of a sandy desert, lava flows, 19k peaks, snow, etc. It could have maybe been a bit more active, but it was a pleasure to explore this region of Bolivia and I was plenty entertained creating punny jokes and solving riddles with my travel companion.
Heading South
It was a long 100+ mi. drive to the small, 14,000 ft, SW Bolivian town of Alota for an early lunch. Our background was of 19,000 ft volcanos as we passed occasional sandstone boulder fields. Volcán Ollague (19,252’) being a fumarole-ing, semi-active volcano on the Bolivian-Chilean border being a standout.
Similar to the prior day on Salar de Uyuni, there would be many stops throughout the day, but these days were different in that the stops were all natural and there would be no more than 7 cars (often no more than our three car caravan) at any place.
We saw our first viewing of the wild alpaca-like Vicuña (similar to the more Southern Guanaco) as we turned off the pavement.
We head South over a 15,600 ft bulge towards our first flamingo lagoon.
Growing up I always associated flamingos with warm areas and Africa (maybe because of the Lion King?). However, I will see thousands of high Andean flamingos eating brine shrimp out of 15,000 ft saline lagoons all day and I’ve also seen them in the desert of Southern Patagonia outside Bariloche.
At this part of our journey South, the flamingos are more white and haven’t achieved much of their pink color. They have beautifully black tipped wings and beaks with a pink head and neck.
The terrain for our off roading driving tour will range from volcanic gravel to something like sand amid a landscape interspersed with mineral lagoons of various colors hosting hundreds of flamingos. In the background we see 17,000-19,000 ft gravel peaks with reddish, orange and gray coloration mixing together like a poured sand art project blended by flood planes.
Towards Chile, there are small white spots of snow resting in depressions above the 18,000 ft altitude. The wind will blow constantly at 25-35 mph making the overcast day chilly in the high desert, requiring 1-2 layers constantly.
Weird Rocks and Unexpected Animals
Outside of lagoons, we stopped at two notable outcrops. One 20-25 ft high volcanic escarpment where impossibly cute chinchilla-like Vizcachas roam with fluffy blowing fur, long black whiskers and a poofy curled tail. I try to ignore tourists trying to pet them while appreciating this novel animal.
Our driver chews Coca leaves as we pass a lava flow on our left and drop down into a little crater-like depression. Here I gape at beautiful cracks, amid wind-eroded featured formations of volcanic rock with hard patina and soft internals. I’ve never seen volcanic rock behave similar to sandstone like this, but given the setting and featuring it had to be volcanic. I would have loved to stay an hour with my climbing shoes.
Throughout the day, we travel 70 miles on volcanic gravel. This is almost the entirety of the Siloli Desert in SW Bolivia. Entering the Eduardo Avaroa Andean Fauna National we view the enormous Laguna Colorada, something like a red pigment “estuary” with salt rises. It hosts thousands of flamingos in layers looking out onto the horizon under volcanic mountains.
Our accommodation for the night is a basic-dorm setting without heat that required most people to wear all their layers despite it being Spring. 😆
Day 3: Hot Springs, A Rock City and The Long Ride Home
Our drivers have us wake up at 4am for a pancake and granola breakfast which our hosts don’t want to provide more than a small cup and stirring spoon to eat. 😂 One person in our car has been running to the bathroom to vomit all night with what seems to be the highly contagious Norovirus and is feeling horrible.
He is somehow stabilized with an anti-nausea and coca tea. He makes it the rest of the travel in waves of discomfort but re-infects my travel companion who just got over a bad bout of the virus after 1.5 weeks of nausea and fatigue. 😢
We visit some very active geothermal vents and then soak for an hour in the geotheral hot springs which run into another saline lagoon. Behind us flamingos dip their heads in the water amid a peaceful volcanic backdrop.
Our 100 mile journey to pavement brings us by a green lagoon after a couple hours.
However, the “Cuidad Italia” might be the most notable stop on our return to Uyuni. This “rock city” is another area which looks both like weathered sandstone and volcanic rock with many large windows, splitter cracks and loads of pockets. In any other situation, there would be hundreds of mostly sport routes here in 5.8-11 range given the ease of access and rock featuring. The “city” is amazing and I climb around like a child before we take off.
I see an entire zone of similar rock for the next 15 miles. A whole climbing area waiting to be developed in a country where very little climbing development has occurred.
It’s many hours over another 100+ miles of pavement driving back to Uyuni where we are unceremoniously told “this is it” outside of the bus terminal to wait for our overnight bus back to La Paz. 😂
These two days brought us through incredibley strange and unexpected high-desert landscapes typically over 15,000 ft and I was very happy to have vastly explored this landscape and region of the country.
