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minimalism at its best

I always thought the ocean is the best minimalist sculpture the world could dish out, but that was before seeing the salar de uyuni. look at someone else's pixs on this site, mine will look the same....you have 12000 hect. of blue sky and perfectly flat white sand. put the horizon line where ever you want. and what few mountains you can see in the distance float on top. plus sometimes there was no wind so that meant perfect silence.

so that's it: blue. white. no sound, no smell. nothingness. wow.

during rainy season, this whole area has a film of water. THAT would be worth coming back to see. but even still, I'm not complaining and our dry surface crackles from the crystals making a great sound. we take our share of goofy photos then head to the touristy isla de piscado. they are charging 10 bolivianos which is pretty much robbery (who owns this island??), but I wanted the view from the top so what the heck...I paid. it was worth it. the island is formed from volcanic activity. there are black rocks squishing out of another type of rock - sort of looks like a chocolate chip cookie made of lava, frozen in time. there are cactus everywhere and at the top was an altar to pachamama (mother earth). I meditated, made an offering, breathed, smiled. I'll never forget that horizon line. and I almost forgot that I had to pay for this. I was late getting back to our jeep - ran down the hill to see it driving off in the distance so just waited for them to drive back. whoops. but I traveled a long way to see something I never knew existed & I decided to be a little selfish today.

our last stop was the infamous salt hotel. lonely planet says ¨the place made of salt where you are treated like dirt¨. to support this, they actually had a sign posted ¨to take a photo, buy something¨. what jerks. I took a photo of their stupid sign, then headed back outside to the much better energy of the salar. the hotel did have a shallow pool of light blue water - once my hand dried, it turned white from the salt. that was cool.

I'm so glad we did this trip starting in chile - to end with the salar saved the best for last! I bought a couple salt crystals (overall I'm buying such little stuff - only things for art), we ate llama & the best grilled chicken in Uyuni. I have to stay here one night, then catch a series of buses to get out of bolivia. their elections are 18 dec - I don't think it will be bad, but I'd rather not risk it and I'm dying to get to patagonia.

I could have stayed for hours on that salar....

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