Adventures and accidents...

Hi everybody! We are really sorry it has taken us such a long time to update the blog, but a lot of things has happened... We are in Cordoba in Argentina and it's sooo hot here! About 35 degrees at the moment! But but, the first city we visited here in Argentina was Salta. And on our second day in Salta Elka had an accident; We were walking in the street on the way home together with some people from our hostel. Two Irish guys were walking behind Elka and suddenly one of them came running from behind and tried to lift Elka up on his shoulders without her knowing. This resulted in Elka falling forward on her head, her upper lip and one front tooth broken! So since the bloody Wednesday 12th of December our travel has been nothing but ambulances and hospitals ;) Life is a bit lighter now, though. Elka has stitches in her lip, but is recovering really well and today we are heading to Buenos Aires to visit a good dentist who will make an artificial tooth.

Well well, let's jump a couple of weeks back in time so you can get the whooole story of our travel since last update...


Bolivia; known for the world's highest everything (quoting Lonely Planet ;) )... We started in Lake Titicaca - the world's highest lake, then we went to La Paz - the world's highest capital and furthermore we visited Potosi - the world's highest city (!) at 4070 masl. So we were getting quite used to the high altitude and the freezing nights in the highlands! Actually, we didn't go below 3000 masl in more than 3 weeks...

Well, after La Paz (were we wrote our last blog) we headed south to Uyuni. Uyuni is a small town in desertlike surroundings with no paved roads, small markets and poor population, but full of touristagencies due to the famous salt flats nearby. We arrived in the early morning and after surfing through different agencies we found an affordable 3-days tour around Salar de Uyuni. We were joined by our swedish friend - Filip - with no guidebook and no toiletpaper ;), a french guy - Pascal - constantly playing horribly on his guitar and crazy taking pictures, his girlfriend - Maria - the only English speaking, another french girl - Astrid - beeing in her own world always humming and singing, and her bolivian boyfriend - Inti - who was very very friendly. The seven of us + a driver were stuffed in an old land cruiser and the tour had begun! After driving about 15 min. from Uyuni we suddenly found ourselves in the middle of snow-white, completely flat landscape stretching to the horizon with the mountains in the far distance. It is difficult to describe this amazing natural phenomenon, but it's a huge area (12,000 sq km) consisting of hard, flat salt as long as you can see. In some areas of the flats there is a 5-20 cm layer of water upon the salt and the water reflecting everything beautifully. We stopped at a famous hotel made of salt and took silly photos in the water and salt. Great fun but our clothes were completely full of salt afterwards! Later we stopped at "Isla de los Pescadores", a small island with giant cactuses in the middle of the salt flats - very impressive! For the night we stayed in a tiny deserted village with a strong wind from the mountains and alpacas in the backyard. Here we visited a very unique cementery which had "mummies" or sceletons inside lava caves. Wouldn't like to be there alone at night! ;)

The second day started early on the very bumby roads (no concrete anywhere in Bolivia!) and our first stop was at an active volcanoe near the Chilean border and it was actually erupting when we came! (though not much). The next stop was at a tranquile laguna full of flamingos and with lamas grassing nearby. Here we stopped for lunch (made by our driver), Pascal was playing his small guitar and we had fun taking pictures of the beautiful flamingos, which came surprisingly close to us. After lunch the jeep headed to our accomadation for the night, a basic place right at Laguna Colorado, a splendid laguna in all kinds of colours, full of flamingos and with lightbrown mountains rising in the background.

The third day we woke up at 3:30 and left the camp at 4:00 in the dark night heading for a viewpoint to see the sunrise. The night was extremely cold (far below zero) but we were stuffed in the jeep and quickly gained heat. Our driver drove like crazy in the old car (as always) and after about 15 min the tire broke! We were all said to go out of the car so he could fix it. The night was so cold, it was terrible, and neither jumping nor extra clothes helped. The whole group ended up standing closely in a small circle to keep heat and now and then we saw one of the other jeeps passing by. Quite disappoiting since our jeep was the first to leave the camp! But looking at the bright side, this moment was very special and one we will remember for a very long time; The night was completely dark and because we were so far away from civilisation the stars were brighter than ever before. The only way to keep heat was to stand closely together and as soon as just one of us moved all the rest were cold. We could see the sun colouring the sky in the distance and we were eagerly waiting for its heat. Soon the car was ready and we drove again heading towards the sunrise lighting up the dark desert. We stopped at a geothermical area with boiling mud pods and a magical forest of steem. Here we enjoyed the beautiful sunrise behind the closeby mountain colouring the steem and starting to give the deserted area heat and life. Around 7 am we arrived to Termas de Polques where we were going to have our breakfast. Before eating we took a wonderful and fully enjoyed dip in the hot springs nearby. Just what we neaded after the cold night! After breakfast we drove on and our next stop was the stunning Laguna Verde, a laguna with amazing turqouise/green colours, salty shores and a huge volcanoe Volcán Licacabur (5930m) rising behind. Having admired the nature here, next part of our trip was the 7 hour drive back to Uyuni! We made a couple of stops on the way, the most interesting was the 'train cementery' right outside Uyuni. This was an area full of rusty, very old trains with a mystic, historical atmosphere.

Back in Uyuni we had a lot of pizza (!) and jumped straight on a bus to Potosi, the world's highest city. Potosi showed to be a very cosy, colonial town with mild climate, formal balconies and narrow streets. The town has a 'golden' history since a silver ore was discovered there in the 16th century and it became Latin America's largest and wealthiest city. The silver mines were also the actual reason why we wanted to visit Potosi. So on the first day we took a tour to the mines - and what a cultural chock! At first, we got boots, clothes, helmets with light and scarves to protect nose and mouth from the toxic gases and dust. Before joining the tour we had to sign a paper which said that if something happened to us or if we died this was our own responsibility! Then we went to the miners' street market were we bought gifts for the working miners we were going to visit. The gifts consisted of soft drinks, alcohol, dynamite or coca leaves, which the miners are chewing constantly to gain strength and avoid hunger. Hereafter we went to an old refinery seeing how the minerals from the mines are distilled. Then finally we arrived to the entrance to the mine at the hilltop Cerro Rico. We were ten people in our group and we walked in one line with a guide in each end. The mine had three levels, the first was the one we entered and the third was 70 meters straight down inside the mountain. Already in the first level a woman jumped off and wanted to go back. Now the tour had begun. On the second level a guy and a girl jumped off aswell. The shafts were completely dark if it wasn't for our headlights. The air was very hot, dusty and lacked oxygen, the shafts were narrow, dirty and often so low that we had to crawl. There was nearly no safety causions and we saw the miners working using medieval techniques. Most miners die of silicosis pneumonia within 10 years of entering the mines! Which doesn't sound strange 'cause the air there is really horrible and they are working demanding physical work all day. Having seen the 3rd level and helped the miners with their work, we were going to climp up the narrow shafts and ladders again. Our guide explained us the new way and let us find it by ourselves - in which we succeeded :) Finally arriving outside in the clean air again, our guides made a trial with the dynamite that they use to blow up inside the mines. And wow - that was the biggest 'bang' ever! Quite impressive... And a good way to end a thought-provoking visit in the silver mines.

From Potosi we took an overnight bus to Villazon, the bordertown to Argentina. We walked over the border and on the Argentinian side we took a bus to Salta and then you know the rest of the story... ;)

As mentioned earlier, we are now in Cordoba. Here we have met Anita, a loving local girl (a friend of Jónína, Elka's brother's girlfriend :)) and Anita has been so nice to us, showing us the town and its surroundings. Now our next stop is Buenos Aires were we will spend Christmas and New Year at a big youth hostel.

Hope you are all great enjoying the cold December in the north ;) and the Christmas spirit which we miss here in the south!

Besos besos para todos! :)