Beautiful Bolivia!

Cowboy Timmy!

From Salta we caught a bus over the border into Bolivia and were there illegally for a few minutes as we followed an old Bolivian guy who took us the back way over the border!  We had to go back to the border crossing and get our passports stamped. We headed straight up to Tupiza, which is only a few km’s from the place where Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were killed- it’s proper cowboy country which I loved, just like The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (my favourite film!).  We decided to go horse riding and had a great morning doing lots of galloping, the scenery was awesome too. 

Tupiza Scenery

View of the mountains

From Tupiza we did a four day tour ending up in Uyani at the salt flats.  We were in a jeep for 4 days and stayed in really basic accommodation for 3 nights- no showers until the final night and it was freezing cold as we were at about 4000m.  

Glamorous Llama (yummy!)

We ate llama on the first day which was really nice although felt a bit bad as we were in a field of llama at the time!  The farmed llama have wool sewn into their ears to mark which farm they’re from which makes them look so cute and a bit glamorous like little earrings. 

Devil's pass, with the gang - Lorna, Guy and Tomar

Llama in the national park, the mountain behind is a volcano.

The tour was fantastic, we had a great group and an amazing guide.  We saw some really beautiful views, loads of llama, vizcachas (a cross between wallabies and rabbits), a fox, condors and flamingos.  

In the hot springs in the national park (our only bath for 3 days!)

The green lake- coloured by arsenic.  Tim suggested I have a little swim... that's what 8 months travelling does!

Flamingos on the red lake at sunrise

Vicacha! Check out his whiskers!

It included going to lots of different lakes of different colours because of the minerals in them, hot springs, little traditional Bolivian villages and finally the salt flats.  It was lots of early mornings, most days we were up before dawn but it was worth it to see the sunrise especially over the salt flats.  We had a lot of fun taking silly photos on the flats too.  The whole four days were brilliant, Bolivia is a really spectacular place and the people are so friendly.  

Another amazing lake/volcano combo

Sunrise on the salt flats

Silly salt flat photos! 

After the tour we got the night bus up to La Paz, the capital of Bolivia and are staying for a few days before crossing over into Peru.  We carried on travelling with some of the guys from the Tupiza tour and had a great night out on Saturday night although the altitude makes hangovers even worse!            

With the rest of the gang from the tour- it got messy from here on in! Ended up in a tiny, sweaty Bolivian nightclub until 5am!