Uyuni Salt Flats

With 3665m above sea level, the Uyuni Salt Flats on the Bolivian altiplano are not only the highest but also the biggest in the world. The white expanse seems to go on forever, but on the edges, white mounts indicate that salt is being mined, eventually enriched with iodine and sold to the Bolivian market for very little money.


Underneath the salt crust still lies some water but another resource has recently come to light: Lithium. A metal that no modern battery-powered equipment can do without. There were doubts whether mining would destroy the uniqueness of the natural wonder but there now seems to be a consensus that mining along the outer rim should not really pose too great an interference - maybe it will even become part of the tourist circuit alongside Isla Incahuasi - an island where thousands of huge cacti grow.



Tourists also love the salt flat for another reason. They get up to incredible photo sessions because of the white background and the clear atmosphere. They are able to create great distortions and special effects in distance and size. However, not every camera lends itself to this kind of image trickery. As the depth of field of digital or film based SLRs is too narrow, small digicams are at a definitive advantage. But one word of caution: many recent digicams that come without viewfinders are virtually useless because of the strong light rendering the viewscreens unusable.

One unmissable attraction on the Uyuni Salt Flats is the "Cemeterio de los trenes" - a place on the edge of the salt flats where old, unused trains have been abandoned. We got there early in the morning when the sun illuminated them very nicely.