Day 2 – The Flamingos

The next day we all hopped in the truck and headed south away from the endless salt. We stretched our legs at a small village, then found alpaca’s a few miles further on. I was trying patiently to get a good video of the alpaca’s with the Gopro, but it just looks like I am having a face off.

Our guide prepared our lunch of breaded chicken, quinoa, veggies, and Snickers while we scampered on some nearby rock formations. Can you find the hare?

Next stop was our first lagoon of many, Cachi Lagoon. I couldn’t believe how many flamingos were there! The water is extremely salty from evaporation and flamingo’s are one of the few creatures that can tolerate the water.

More driving and we came to the famous “Rock Tree”. It was a stunning location full of boulders that had been weathered by the blowing sands. This made very sculpted shapes and impossible looking features.

As we drove higher and higher the wind steadily increased. And there are no trees or vegetation in the Atacama desert to slow it down so we took the full brunt of the wind. At Reserva Nacional de Fauna Andina Eduardo Avaroa (Red Lake) I had to hide behind rocks to stay warm. It was worth it though to see the thousands and thousands of flamingos!

The sun was getting low as we arrived at Sol de Manana. I believe this was the high point on our tour at 16,000′! Luckily this was a geothermal area and the steam protected me a little from the piercing wind. We had fun exploring and playing around the mud pools and steam fissures being careful not to fall in any!

A bit more driving took us to our Hostel for the night on the edge of Laguna Chalviri. This hostel didn’t have much, but they did had a hot spring pool of which we took full advantage. Dinner was soup and spaghetti with meat sauce, the a dip in the hot springs and I was ready for bed! We woke to a breakfast of fruit, yogurt and pancakes before loading up the truck.