Showing 1-22 of 22 results
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Inti Wara Yassi – Blood, Sweat and Tears (and other unique memories)
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 15 December 2010
There is a volunteering organisation in Parque Machia, Bolivia, called Inti Wara Yassi, that helps rehabilitate animals where possible, or enrich the lives of animals that can´t be released. It is incredibly hard work but fabulously rewarding and an amazing experience. This post is going to read as my diary, to give you an idea of [...]
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Sucre – A Mind-Expanding Experience
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 8 November 2010
As cities go, Sucre doesn’t feel like one. It feels more like a busy town. Everyone tells you that Sucre is the ‘white city’, and it fitted the description well. On some well-founded advice from friend we had decided to stay in Sucre for a week and use it as a base for a week’s [...]
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Potosi, Bolivia…
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 3 November 2010
Arriving anywhere at 2am isn’t going to be good, let alone a mining town like Potosi. We were expecting to arrive at 3am so when everyone started to get off the bus we asked the driver and found out that a once-in-a-lifetime event had happened: a Bolivian bus had arrived early! The bus ride itself [...]
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An Out-Of-This-World Experience – The Uyuni Salt Flats
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 1 November 2010
Doing the salt flats tour is the easiest way to have an ‘other worldly’ experience without going mad or joining NASA. From the very beginning of the trip I was transported away from any landscape I have known. Even the wildlife is completely alien: animals, like the Vicuñas and Llamas, that apparently live on dust [...]
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The Salt Flats From San Pedro de Atacama– Working Out the Details…
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 29 October 2010
The first stage of Salt Flats tour is finding a decent tour operator and booking. We were lucky enough to have teamed up with an Australian couple (Ryan & Brenna) who had heard about a decent company. The companies all offer the same accommodation and stop at the same beauty spots. For us the critical [...]
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Tupiza, Bolivia: Horse Riding in the Wild West
Blog: Never Ending Voyage - 24 September 2010
Icy cold winds blow what little air there is through the dizzying altitudes of the Bolivian Andes as buses born before the War hurry along the windy roads, wheels suicidally kissing the lips of impossibly high cliffs. We were apprehensive about this foreboding country. Here, nature is in charge and she cares little for you.
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Snapshots: 玻利維亞 Bolivia
Blog: Diaries of a Vagabonding Couple - 3 June 2010
Endless salt flats of Uyuni Extracting salt from the world's largest salt flat Salt cones, Uyuni salt flats Salt cones and 4x4, Uyuni salt flats Light streaks burn the horizon at dawn, Uyuni salt flats Thermal waters in Bolivian Andes Vicuñas grazing before relentless mountains Bolivian Dreamscapes More Snapshots...
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The Bolivian Salt Flats - Part 2
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 26 May 2010
Day two started with a half past six breakfast, which oddly consisted of tea and stodgy cake, then back on the road by seven, leaving the salt flat and salt hotel behind us. We headed for the Bolivian desert and there were plenty of miles to cover so we stopped at the next village along for some supplies - in the form of more beer. Drinking a few cans while travelling in the 4x4 was an inspired idea. I was glad to see our driver didn't partake despite Brice offering!
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The Bolivian Salt Flats - Part 1
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 25 May 2010
We set off mid-morning, once our Land Cruiser had been loaded up with luggage, fuel, food, plus the four French people that would make up our group. A standard three day tour will take six people and they manage to fill the cars, no doubt by tempting lone travellers with rock bottom prices at the last minute. I'd say there is something to be said for standing on the street at five to eleven looking disinterested. Its bound to get you a great bargain!
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The Bolivian Salt Flats – Possibly One Of The Most Amazing Places On Earth
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 25 May 2010
This was why I came to Bolivia. It was the sudden fire of enthusiasm in my brother’s eyes when I mentioned which part of the world I was visiting, and the shock and horror when I mentioned that I’d never heard of the salt flats. Anything that produces that reaction, I decided, was worth seeing. [...]
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Uyuni – The Most Basic Tourist-Town Ever
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 24 May 2010
And it’s not just me that thinks that, you know. Even one guidebook – and you know what guidebooks are like when it comes to getting in there with the locals and being part of the culture and all – when talking about places to eat in Uyuni, actually said, “Avoid the market – this [...]
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Bolivia's second 'Death Road'?
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 24 May 2010
I couldn't tell you exactly how many miles we have travelled since arriving in Mexico city last October. But I'm fairly sure that I can now tell you where the most difficult of those miles occurred. After spending time in the plush and serene surroundings of Tarija, the bus ride north towards Uyuni served as a reminder that Bolivia is amongst the poorest of the countries we've visited.
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Tarija - ahem, and an important football match
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 21 May 2010
If you're going to be turfed out of a bus somewhere at five o'clock on a cold morning, you could do worse than Tarija. After hanging around the (outdoor) bus station chatting to a fellow Brit, who had a flight to catch from Rio and not much time to get there, we went into town to use up some more hours before we could reasonably turn up at our hotel. Luckily an up-market restaurant opened its doors and let us in for breakfast - it's becoming a familiar story!
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Tarija – Back To The Warm, Time To Thaw Out
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 20 May 2010
Frankly, it didn’t feel like that when we first arrived. The bus from Sucre, which left at 3pm the previous day, rolled into Tarija terminal an hour ahead of schedule at 5am, whereupon we all blearily got off the bus and… did what? What are you meant to do? It’s 5am. It’s night. It’s certainly [...]
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Sucre – Wow!
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 20 May 2010
Not an overreaction: Sucre, Bolivia’s actual capital (as opposed to La Paz, which everyone just assumes is the capital), is astonishingly gorgeous. Coming into the city you will find yourself in a clean, beautiful, looked-after place with stunning and well-maintained architecture and many parks and plazas. You might as well have entered another country. This, [...]
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Sucre - Bolivia
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 17 May 2010
Sucre is the most modern place I’ve seen so far in Bolivia. It is Bolivia’s other capital and is home to a considerably slower pace of life than La Paz. This can be just what you need. After all, as much as I enjoyed La Paz and all of its energy, I wouldn’t have wanted to stay there longer than the week that we did. Sucre would be a good place to study, should you want to learn a bit of Spanish for example. We studied in Cuenca, Ecuador and there are many similarities between the two cities. It is also lower than Potosi, which meant it was much warmer, thankfully.
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The Potosi Mines - Bolivia
Blog: A Travel Diary from Mexico, Central and South America - 16 May 2010
When I read one description of the Potosi mines I wasn’t all that keen on visiting. It said they have been described as “the mouth of hell” and that visitors should be aware that a trip down into them is both physically and emotionally draining. However, out of sheer curiosity (Sophie’s, not mine!) we made the long journey south from La Paz. An overnight bus to pretty much any destination in Bolivia will get you in at about 6am. I have thought a lot about why they schedule them like this.
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The Potosi Silver Mines – Quite A Workout
Blog: Viva Latin America! - 16 May 2010
Not that that’s the point, obviously. You’re meant to go to these mines and be appalled at the medieval conditions in which these miners spend their days. You’re not meant to look at it as good exercise for the week. Right, the background is as follows: the Spanish show up in Bolivia and start conquering [...]
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Day 89: White Desert, Lost Necklace, and a Broken Camera..
Blog: Diaries of a Vagabonding Couple - 13 May 2010
Salt.. Salt.. nothing but blindingly white salt! Waiting for 2:50am train to Tupiza, our last Bolivian stop. There have been many moments like these where we find ourselves stuck in awkward hours… can’t wait to rest in a decent place – the last time we felt really comfortable and clean was in Cusco, almost 2 weeks ago. Backpacking Bolivia can be tough… Who shrunk my wife?? ...I just wanted
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Photo silliness on the Salar de Uyuni
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 19 October 2009
Let’s face it, spectacular as its landscapes are, one of the main reason every backapcker wants to go to the Salar de Uyuni is to take lots of silly photos and videos. I had thought that all those trick shots would be tiresome to set up and take, but it turned out to be some [...]
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The Salar de Uyuni
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 18 October 2009
If there was one place more than any other that I was excited about visiting in South America, it was the Salar de Uyuni. Before I traveled, I read countless blog posts and saw hundreds of amazing photos about the place, and I couldn’t wait to see it for myself. After a slightly frustrating evening in [...]
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Going down the mines
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 17 October 2009
If the Death Road turned out to be nowhere near as scary as I’d been expecting, my next big excursion turned out to far more. Potosi was once the biggest and richest city in the whole of the Americas – and at one point even bigger than Madrid, the imperial capital, and all because of one [...]
Showing 1-22 of 22 results
