So after all the fun in San Pedro we set off on a 3 day 4x4 tour to get to Uyuni in Bolivia. We took a bus from San Pedro to the bolivian border (going from 2400m to 4300) in about 1 hr and were then bundled into a jeep with the 2 english girls we already knew and 2 Californian girls and our driver Marcos (who was meant to be Carlos as we'd requested and been promised him and were also told was Carlos but we soon worked out that he was infact Marcos).
The 1st day of the trip was really awesome crossing the amazing sandy nothingness of the Atacama at really high altitude (went over 5000m on the first day and didn't go below 4250m til the 3rd day) and occasionally finding something amazing to stop at such as enourmous salt lagoons, bubbling geysers, thermal pools we could swim in and eventually stopping a a very basic refugio at 4300m which had a few beds and we got served a pasta meal. It's location was awesome - right next to an enourmous salt lake with loads of flamingos in it, however it soon got very cold (apparently it got down to -15) but we had our sleeping bags so it wasn't too bad.
The 2nd day included more of almost the same, stopping off occasionally to see sights such as the stone tree and some iced over salt lakes and passing through some tiny little towns which seemed completely deserted and we stopped at another little hostel which was a little warmer and nicer than the night befores.
The 3rd day included an very early start to get to the Salar de Uyuni salt flat (the biggest in the world) for sunrise. The sunrise was really gorgeous and we then went to the nearby "island" for breakfast and another view of the salt flats. After spending some time taking photos we headed into Uyuni via a train graveyard (just lots of old rusty trains).
All in all a pretty good trip, we all seemed to handle the altitude pretty well which was lucky and very useful for being in Bolivia!
Wowwwwwwww I am VERY jealous. Very.
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