Above is the view of the ancient city of Mardin in South Eastern Turkey, from our hotel balcony. The minaret did not light up until well after the blue hour ended, which is why the sky is black. Mardin is a UNESCO protected city and one of the most significant cities located in SE Turkey. It is strategically located on a rocky hill near the Tigris River. Mardin is historically Syriac and Assyrian, though now part of Turkey.
This cemetery has one of the best views of the Old Quarters in Mardin. We were warned not to fly the drone to take photos over the cemetery, since it is 20 miles to the Syrian border. We did get the one image of the neighboring city (center) before being told we had to stop our flight though.
As we were driving between cities, we passed a rather large herd of sheep and goats, which we stopped to photograph (top row, plus middle-left and middle-right). Batman provided a unique lunch stop. We loved the name of the city, and the town street signs were interesting (middle, plus bottom row). It seemed rather surprising that the town has not leveraged their name with the comic and movie hero, but there was no indication of such a tie-in.
We also photographed the Deyrulzaferen Monastery which is an important Syriac Orthodox Monastery built in the 4th Century BC.
We really enjoyed seeing the shadows cast onto the ground around the monastery. The late afternoon light was a photographer’s delight.
We next walked through the bazaar area of Mardin, photographing local craftsmen and spent time taking photos of a man in green shirt reading Koran while on break from his copper making (middle-left). There were lots of fresh fruits and vegetables. It was pretty obvious that there are very few young people left in town. It seems they have largely moved to urban areas to find better paying work.
Some vendors sold prayer beads, which are used to count (middle left). The number of beads on the chain depended on the religion. Throughout the area, people smiled and were willing to be photographed whenever they saw our cameras.
Many vendors were preparing food their customers (middle), while many others were making products (lower-right), or selling from their small stalls.
We have always enjoyed authenticity and this place met the criteria for an interesting and exotic travel experience.
We continue our journey exploring Eastern Turkey enroute to Van, which is filled with ancient sites and many views of Mount Arawat. We took a ferry ride out to Akdamar Island, to photograph an Armenian church. This was a perfect chance to send up our drone, to get aerial images of the church (upper-left, upper-center and lower-right).
Fortunately, we had clear skies and Mount Aarat (where Noah is believed to have landed) was not covered by its usual shroud of clouds.
We climbed to the ancient site of Cavustepe which was a fort built by the Urartians in the 7th Century BC. The caretaker we met is one of the few in the world who can read and wrote the cuneiform script, He described it in detail, though we did not transcribe, nor remember, his explanation. He later wrote a message to us in that lost language in the sand (lower-right).
We were able to view the 18th century Hosab Castle from both higher angle (via drone, center) and lower angle (via handheld camera). Enroute, we stopped to photograph reflections of the mountains in the lake (upper-right). When we returned to the hotel this evening, we were greeted by a bride in the lobby, who was waiting for her husband to check in (middle-bottom). Many wedding couples stay here to be photographed in front of landmarks.
As we traveled along the Iranian border, we were warned not to fly the drone. We were still able to capture stunning views of Ishak Pasha Palace in the morning from a cliff above (upper-left), then had a chance to check out the insides. We were able to see the beautiful shadows cast inside as well as much detailed carvings. This palace was built during the Ottoman period, and is one of the few surviving historical palaces from that period.
At sunset, we found an opening in the fence into the pasture and photographed the 8th Century BC Van Fortrress with herd of sheep in the foreground.
Enroute to view the 50 meter high Muradiye Waterfalls, which is where locals come and picnic located 80 km from Van. We enjoy seeing the rural countryside of Eastern Turkey, where many people are still dressed in traditional clothing.
Here are more views of Mount Ararat and an archaeological site believed to be the final location of Noah’s Ark (middle-top). The dimensions cast on the ground are approximately the same as the size of the ark mentioned in the bible, and dating soil samples reveal human activity match the timing, however it is still quite controversial whether this was the correct location
Herding cats is a colloquial term, and that was what we found in a local university research center. We had an opportunity to photographed the Van cats, known for having two different color eyes, one blue and one green. One cat was captivated by Mehmet, as it jumped on his back (center).
We photographed the ruins of the old Armenian capital of Ani located right on the border between Turkey and Armenia. Ani is an old fort situated at the top of a massive hill, and is currently being restored. We met shepherds with their cattle still working the hills.
There are impressive ruins of Armenian churches and settlements on this large site. We stopped to photograph the 13th century, arched bridge known as “Cobandede Koprusu” with its reflections in the Aras River.
Lots of photos of daily life with its colorful characters. We found that people are quite friendly and enjoyed having their pictures taken.
Enroute, we were capturing images of a vendor selling giant cabbages (upper-right). Cabbage heads at the vendors stalls in town were humungous, and we’re wondering about how to eat the large salads for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
View from our hotel in Kars at the Blue Hour. The Blue Hour is significant for photographers, as it is the hour after sunset when the sky turns the most blue.
We stopped to photograph the Tuzluca Salt Mine in Dogubeyazıt. The Tuzluca Salt Mines are still active and located on the road between Iğdır and Kars and can be seen here on our East Turkey Road.
We have just started the “off the beaten track photo tour of Eastern Turkey” with Mehmet Ozbalci of Turfantastik. This will be our sixth trip with Mehmet since discovering him nearly a decade ago on our first tour of Western Turkey (click here to see the list of 26 blog posts from that trip).
The photo above is a view from our hotel, Arcadia Blue Hotel, in Istanbul. To our surprise, the Blue Mosque is now bathed in warm pink lighting instead of the previous blue after the recent remodel.
We typically arrive a couple days early for these trips. That allows us to acclimate to the timezone change, and allow for any flight problems to be resolved. Well… this time we really needed that buffer. When we arrived in Istanbul, we discovered that our luggage was still in London (our 2nd stop on the 3-hop flight between Honolulu and Istanbul). We have AirTags in all our luggage and could tell both our bags were still in the Turkish Airlines storage area at Heathrow Airport. After 11 calls from me, and several more by Mehmet, our luggage finally arrived 4 days later… in Trabzon, another airport as we had already left Istanbul. We were rather anxious about getting those suitcase, as they had our cold-weather clothes, needed a few days later.
Other than the wasted time on phone calls, and the small amount of money spent on temporary clothing needs, this was just a minor hiccup in a trip that otherwise went smoothly. After having traveled to 98 countries (this is our third time in Turkey), these small bumps in the road are just just something we can shrug off and use to tell stories at parties… ☺
We spent the first couple days in Istanbul just wandering the streets in the Galata Tower area. We lived in Istanbul for 3 months in 2016 on a home-exchange, so we were already familiar with most of the landmarks. We were surprised at the long Disneyland-like lines to get into the Haghia Sofia and the Blue Mosque this time though. We were able to just breeze through in 2016. The tourists are back… (Of course, we do not consider ourselves tourists… We Are Travelers!☺)
Our tour will explore various UNESCO designated world heritage sites in Eastern Turkey, where our civilization began. One of our first stops was to photograph the 14th century Greek Orthodox monastery of Holy Mary known as Sumela located on the side of a cliff enroute to Uzungöl, a small mountain village in the Caucasus. Our trip takes us across many tea plantations, where we occasionally stopped to watch the lucious tea plateaus.
Reflections from Uzungöl Mosque onto Lake Uzungöl (upper left). We then walked around the village of Karaster, which is a village where the nomadic tribes roam and a second home to some Turkish families. Enroute, we’re enjoying the beautiful fall colors.
We returned to shoot the quaint Uzungöl mosque at the magic blue hour, with its two minarets cast onto the still lake below. Mehmet captures the interior of the mosque (upper-right) as well as more scenes enroute (middle-right).
In Erzurum, we explored many ways to capture the reflection of the Yakutiye Madrasa on the glass tile (lower-right). This was originally a 13th century theological school, and is now a museum. We next photographed the 12th century Ulu Mosque, one of the oldest mosques in Turkey. Regular characters enjoy just sitting in the park to socialize (upper-right).
Before lunch, we shot the “Oltu” bazaar in Erzurum, which is known for its “Oltu” stone, a semi precious stone (fossilized carbon) known as black amber.
On our walk to lunch to taste the best kebabs in Turkey, at a restaurants known as “Cağ Kebab”. we passed by a 3-D mural depicting scenes from World War 1. All but 200 Armenians were executed in WW1.
More scenes from medieval Erzurum, with its rich history. Here’s a link providing more details of the town and history of its people.
After 3 years of absence due to Covid restrictions, the annual Shinnyo Lantern Floating festival returned to Oahu, Hawaii this Memorial Day again. Shinnyo-en is an international Buddhist community and teaches “reality, or the true nature of all things”. The red lanterns provide light and guide the souls of the deceased toward peace. The light also symbolizes sending away the darkness, and welcoming a bright, peaceful future for the upcoming year.
This was my first time seeing this festival, and it was well worth working through the crowds for. The festival was held on Ala Moana Beach, which is only a little over a mile from our home. Evelyn could not attend, because she had foot surgery just a week before and the crowded sand is not conducive to crutches. Since I took my moped, I could wind through the cars and park very close to the launch point.
Arriving early, there was plenty of time to people-watch.
A series of huge video screens were scattered across the beach, allowing everyone to see the official speeches and performances. The festival opened with a speech in Hawaiian by Her Holiness Shinso Ito (top left), with English translations shown on the screen.
As the festival began, approximately a dozen men from fire, police and military were introduced, who then entered the water with surfboards to act as water-based security (upper left). Drummers then played Shinnyo Taiko to call people together (upper right, plus video at the end below). Official photographers and videographers were the only ones allowed on boats, or who were brave enough to take tripods into the ocean. I walked into the water knee high as the beach was packed.
The beach filled up with an estimated 50,000 people by the time the official festivities began. You can see the crowds at Magic Island (bottom left).
The sky got into the act and provided a show for all attendees too. It rained for about 5 minutes — just enough to show us a nice rainbow (upper left), and a 3/4 moon passed overhead (upper right). Flights from the Honolulu international airport pass just off the coast, and the sky provided a colorful backdrop (lower right). Though the festival organizers asked multiple times that there be no drones, there were 4 or 5 people who ignored the request and flew directly over the crowds (lower left).
Attendees are only allowed to float officially provided lanterns, such as those above. The lanterns are made from a very lightweight wood that has been treated to be fireproof. Attendees can obtain one of the available 6000 lanterns per family for free. They then write their own remembrances onto the paper walls. After the celebration, all lanterns are retrieved to be reused the following year. “Remembrances and prayers are removed and handled in a proper and spiritually respectful way.”
With 6000 lanterns being launched, there was an almost unending parade of people to photograph. Above are a few of my favorites of people walking down to the water to launch their personal lanterns. It is a memorable event and extremely well organized.
Here is a short 80 second video to give a sense of the festival. It starts off with a portion of the Shinnyo Taiko musical performance, and then a couple of short segments of people walking their lanterns down to the water.
I have been experimenting with several photographic techniques in recent months. Now that we are between travels, I can spend some time in my studio. I thought I would share a few images from last night’s session.
These are all macro images of ice cubes. I used distilled water, then injected a small amount of soda water into the trays, and froze them in a styrofoam container in the freezer. That causes the water to freeze very slowly, making it crystal clear. The soda water injected via syringe during the freezing time inserts these firework-like threads through the ice.
I then put the ice cube on a glass sheet, and set the camera on a slider to give smooth motion. I fire off photos at 20 frames per second for about 5 or 6 seconds, giving me more than 100 frames of each ice cube. I throw away those completely out of focus at the start and the end, leaving me with approximately 60 frames where part of the ice cube is in focus. Those are then processed through software to do what is called “focus stacking,” taking the tiny sliver of ice in focus in each image and combining them to give a depth of field not possible in any physical camera.
In this case, I have a red LED on the right, and a blue LED light on the left, to give the colors in the ice.
I hope you enjoy them as much as I did in making them. These abstract images are my first real successes with this technique after 3 months of trial and error!
The Republic of Bolivia was founded in 1825. Although Spanish is the official language, there are also 36 Indigenous languages that are officially recognized. The indigenous people felt they were being ignored by the country’s political leaders, and it is estimated there are between 40-70% of the 12 million population are indigenous and minorities. In 2009, a new constitution was created, which greatly increased the rights of the indigenous peoples, and officially changed the name of the country to the Plurinational State of Bolivia.
We returned to La Paz on our last day, to catch a flight to Lima, Peru which would return us to Cuenca, Ecuador the next morning. To our surprise, it was a national holiday and there was a major parade going on in the streets outside our hotel. When driving to the hotel, there were busloads of indigenous people coming from the rural areas to join in the celebrations, and the street to our hotel was blocked off. The lower row of images barely gives a glimpse of the size of this celebration. The parade is shown lower-left, but it actually goes off well past what we could see, as it had already been going for hours before we arrived on the scene right in front of our hotel. There was also a large outdoor stage at San Francisco Plaza (lower-right), with concert-loud music and political speeches, filled elbow-to-elbow with people. There were few non-Bolivian tourists and Mestizos (people of mixed ancestry) in sight. We were warned not to bring out our DSLR cameras, and to only use our iPhones to photograph.
This parade was part of the national holiday and comprised of indigenous Bolivians, celebrating the 2009 changes that expanded their rights. As with any parade, there was accompanying music. The music was almost solely of wooden flutes handmade by the musicians (top-left and bottom-right), plus drums. This parade also coincided with Chinese New Year, and we saw one small group on a side street performing the lion dance with a Chinese Lion (top-center).
As we wandered looking for dinner, we came across a uniquely Bolivian Yamaha motorcycle shirt (center). Before the advent of street lights, policemen would stand in elevated platforms blowing their whistle and pointing, to direct traffic. This very realistic statue (lower-left) was just outside our hotel door, in honor of that lost profession — I had to do a double-take before I realized it was a statue, rather than a policemen telling our driver what to do!
The parade appeared to be broken into many dozens of small indigenous groups, each with a banner promoting their particular interest. Unfortunately, we had no idea what most of these banners were about. A straight translation did not really shed much light in most cases. I expect they would make more sense if we knew the local politics and issues better.
Besides the group banners, many men also carried flags. A surprise to us was that indigenous men welcomed getting their photos taken. And, of course, there were also kids, a subject we often love to photograph.
Another staple of any parade is a supply of food vendors selling street food.
It was often hard to tell who was part of the parade, and who was a spectator. In many cases, people would come out of the parade, sit and rest awhile, then return to the parade. There were also a couple of media people there, using camera phones and small pocket microphones for interviews. The man in the center is shaking his fist to emphasize a point he is making to the journalist holding the microphone for him to speak into. We were awed by by the variety and color of the traditional clothing, and the friendliness of the Bolivian people.
We have finally reached the end of our journey in Bolivia. We did not see everything we had hoped to, but did manage to capture some scenes that were unexpected. In some ways, the flamingos were a highlight of the trip, so we will end with one last collection of images of those pink birds. Our guide showed us video he captured just a month earlier, with the flamingo mating dance, which was something National Geographic might have filmed.
The scenes of Bolivia were quite varied on our trip. Rather than showing a series of short videos on this topic or that, I decided to create one two-minute video with scenes from throughout the week. I hope you enjoy the video — and rest of this photographic presentation — as much as we did in putting it together.
After hours of driving, we stopped at a fumerol field. As the image of our elevation app shows lower-left, we were at over 16,000 feet elevation at this location. I wondered if my drone would handle this altitude, but though it kept complaining about the high altitude, it did amazingly well. Our guide, Alvaro, is shown in the lower-right image in the car as we approached this destination.
This region is basically an area where sulfur and other noxious chemicals bubble to the surface. This creates the yellow-tinged landscape (center). The drone images (center-bottom) look mostly like rather disgusting mud bubbling up. As I tried to take more drone images, the high winds finally got the better of the drone though, and I had to bring her home, to avoid losing her into the Pits of Hell…
As we continued to drive across the High Desert for hours, I was struck with how this much feels like driving across Mars. I asked our driver to stop, so I could capture some images above of how we’re driving to nowhere. The road (lower-right) came-and-went and sometimes we seemed to be driving across totally barren lands. God Bless GPS! ☺ The driver is so highly skilled to find tracks in the middle of no roads, aiming towards distant landmarks along the Andes, so we could always sit back and enjoy the ride, without worrying about whether we were lost or not.
Our very long drives across the Bolivian High Desert brought us to many stunning landscapes. One such was the lagoon above. Though there are flamingos there (look closely at the bottom image), we decided they were not really the focal point here, and instead focussed on the scenic landscape and reflections.
We visited so many lagoons, that I am afraid I lost count or names of them. One lagoon to see coots required a walk of about a mile to reach, passing across a valley where the llamas graze. It is probably one of the most beautiful spots in the high desert.
On this particular trek, the lagoon itself was okay. However, along the hike, we saw numerous animals, some of which we had never seen before. The viscacha upper-left resembles a rabbit with a squirrel tail, but is native only to South America. Lower-right shows a Bolivian ostrich, something we had teased our guide about for days as not really existing…?
One of our stops near our hotel (hotel Tayka del Desierto at 14,839′ is the highest hotel in the world) was the “canyon of rocks” in the high plateau. We spent an hour or so here, capturing the odd rock formations carved out by the constant wind.
After the “rock formation” area, we drove to the Lost City. Though similar to the prior stop, these rock formations struck an instant “image recognition” in them. Though also formed by wind, this area seemed to create rock formation that I could instantly put a name to. Photos often lose that “I see a bear” effect, but these are so strong I still see them when writing this. Can you see them too?
When arranging our trip to Bolivia, we had two major photographic goals — the mirror scenes on the salt flats, and flamingos in the high desert lagoons. We never got the mirror images we envisioned, due to the current drought in Bolivia. Flamingos though, were a different matter!
We have chased flamingos across many countries. We were always promised flocks of flamingos, but when we arrived, they had just left, or not yet arrived, or were missing due to climate changes. Finally, in Bolivia, we saw more flamingos in one place than we ever imagined!
We saw a few in various lagoons, mostly far away with barely enough camera pixels to show a usable photo. Then we hit three lagoons with an amazing number of flamingos that we could approach close enough to get some reasonable images. On one of the lagoons, I was even able to put up my drone and see them from a few feet away (my new DJI Mini 3 Pro drone is so quiet that you would not know if it was flying 5 feet from you).
Above are just a few of the hundreds of photographs we took of individuals or small groups of flamingos on these lagoons. Occasionally other birds would join the feast too (lower-right).
Most of these lagoons existed in magnificent regions where it was easy to forget the birds, and instead focus on the surrounding landscape (center). Since we had really hoped to shoot flocks of flamingos though, we mostly kept our focus there, and above shows a few of the lakes full of the pink birds that we saw.
At one point, we saw an eagle on the side of a lagoon that had caught a bird and was eating it for lunch. We were able to walk to within about 10 feet of the bird, and my drone was able to get within 5 feet to capture images of his meal. Eventually we approached a bit too closely, and he flew away (lower-left), leaving the limited remainder of his meal behind (lower-right)
One of our more interesting stops in High Bolivia was the Train Graveyard of the Uyuni Salt Flats. For decades, this area was a major world supplier of Bauxite. Recall the “20-mule train” commercials we saw in the 1950s? This was the source, and still is today to a very large extent. This “graveyard” is where the old locomotives were dumped when transportation moved from coal to oil and the old engines were no longer relevant. There are also a few bauxite cars here that were damaged and brought here to be disposed of.
As can be seen in the (center) photo, this is a popular tourist stop for photographs. Fortunately, our guide, Alvaro (to be seen in future story block below) rushed us here before the tourist crowd arrived, and then showed us places in the area that were photographically interesting, but not crawling with other tourists. All the other photos on this block were shot in that area, blissfully empty of others. We only saw the crowds in the center image when leaving the area to return to our car.
We had lunch in the small town of San Cristobal. We had told our guide we had never eaten Llama, so that was served to us. Unfortunately it was overcooked, and tough. Alvaro (our guide) agreed with that assessment…
After lunch, we wandered around town, and found a wedding in progress in a small church. We were told that this was rather rare, since it was a small town, and many people chose to go to a more exotic (and expensive) location for their weddings.
Finally we checked into one of the famed salt hotels, Hotel de Sal Luna Salada. The entire hotel is made of salt, and is located at 12,000 feet elevation. The hotel was a significant surprise to me. It was elaborate, in the style of many upscale hotels we have stayed at around the world. Floors were salt crystals, though most (not all !) were covered with wood pathways (center). There were numerous comfortable meeting rooms off the main hallways (left column and upper-right), and the registration office had some very nice art hanging on the walls (lower-right).
The room was comfortable, well laid out for computer and office use, though internet access was limited (reasonable in the middle of a 4,000 square mile salt flat !). There was an in-room heater, though we never used it, since the blankets were so comfortable. To my surprise, this is a hotel I would recommend to anyone staying in this area!
We had scheduled two nights to go out and do some star shooting. Our guide was very cooperative and willing, but unfortunately the weather was not. From the night we planned our first night out until the end of our trip, the sky remained completely overcast.
Fortunately, I went outside our hotel the first night we arrived. Between the low temperature of a High Desert night, and the howling wind, I nearly lost my fingers from frostbite! But I did manage to capture exactly one decent night sky photograph, as shown above, with our hotel in the foreground.
The primary goal in going to Bolivia was to see the Uyuni Salt Flats. For years, we have seen photos of a mirror-like surface that stretched for miles, and we wanted to see it (and photograph it, of course!) for ourselves. We decided to go to Bolivia in the rainy season on a “private tour,” with the two of us, one guide and one driver. Our tour operator Kuoda Travel did an excellent job of providing a guide who was reasonably knowledgable about photography, as he had led private tours with other professional photographers in the past. Both the guide and the tour agency were also extremely flexible, responding to our needs — both physical (16,000′ elevation at our age meant we were moving slowly!), and based on our evolving interests as the trip advanced.
Alas, the mirror effect only occurs when there have been recent rains, and climate changes have resulted in a drought on the salt flats for the past year. With no recent rains, we only found small pockets of water with enough water to show any reflections. The wind also acted to make our photographic life more difficult by creating constant ripples across the thin layer of water, destroying the mirrors (center and bottom image foregrounds).
We arranged a couple of sunrises on the salt flats, and Alvaro (our guide) brought us to this location on our first morning on the salt flats. With the sun coming up, we had the view on the top row above. Beautiful colors… but a bit drab. What was missing?
Oh… We were being “followed” by a group of 15 Korean tourists, who seemed to show up everywhere we went this week. Sure enough, as the sun began to rise, they parked RIGHT IN FRONT OF US! Breathe… In… Out… Oh, wait… Maybe they did not ruin our shot after all…
The Koreans lined up and posed, while one of their guide cars drove around them with an iPhone and stabilizer shooting video of them (bottom two rows). When I looked at the photos back in my studio, and my blood pressure had returned to normal… I decided they actually added an interesting element to the sunrise photos. ☺
Our guide described a stop later in the day as “The Hand Of God.” This turned out to be a section of the salt desert set aside for artists to create sculptures entirely out of salt. It was actually not called “The Hand of God” as a region, but rather one specific sculpture was named such — as seen in the center image above, with our guide leaning on it. Yep. Our guide was the artist that created that particular salt sculpture. ☺
The area also had many other artist sculptures, entirely made of salt from the desert, as seen in the other images. Center-right can be seen a section of the field that has been cut up to provide salt blocks to the artists, while our guide kneels and points out the layers on the salt in the lower-right photo. The thickness of the layers here are very analogous to the rings on trees, and tells not only the age of the layer, but also the water environment of each year — thick layers being evidence of a wet year, while thin layers (like 2022) being evidence of a relative drought.
After visiting the salt art display area, we drove for an hour across the salt to have lunch at an “island” called Isla Incahuasi. Personally, when I think of island, I envision a rock outcropping from water. I was therefore having trouble visualizing when our guide kept saying we would have lunch at an island on the salt flat…?
Aha! An island does indeed refer to a rocky outcropping, but the area around it does not need to be wet. In this case, it was a dry seabed of the Salt Flats. After driving for a seemingly endless stretch over salt with no roads (lower-left), we finally came to our “island” and parked (center). These islands look like they’re floating in a mirage from a distance. This rocky outcropping was filled with cactus, which I never expected in such a salty area (top row and lower-right). While there, a very nice picnic table was brought out, with elegant silverware, wine, and a rather delicious cold lunch.
After lunch, we drove a short distance to the location of the original salt flat hotel, at which point dozens of flags could be seen planted (bottom-center). We were told that visitors planted their national flags at the site. The wind was so severe that some of the older flags were rather tattered, while others had clearly been replaced more recently with less damaged flags. I briefly considered sending up my drone for an aerial view, but a quick look at the position of those flags (ie, straight horizontal), shows how hard the wind was blowing. Combined with an altitude of 12,000 feet, I decided to keep my drone grounded…!
Another sculpture in the middle of nowhere (nothing visible for an hour’s drive in any direction) was named Stairway to Heaven. This was created for the 2020 Olympics held in Bolivia. When the salt flats are wet, the sculpture seems to float, and a person standing on top looks like they are standing on an infinite view of clouds, or Heaven. Originally there was a figure running up the stairs to light an Olympic fire at the top, all made of salt. Unfortunately, the Bolivian government removed those figures, but they did leave the stairs.
There is a natural springs that feeds water to a very small portion of the flats. There is a tradition to dip your feet into the baths (upper-left and lower-right). This spring is also “in the middle of nowhere,” though since it was on the route from the Stairs to our hotel, it was a nice 5 minute stop to stretch our legs and take the photographs shown.
The Salt Flats at Uyuni is the largest in the world covering more than 4,000 square miles, and considered one of the most extreme and remarkable vistas, if you’re lucky. At sunset and sunrise, we saw reflections on the south end of the Uyuni Salt Flats, as seen in earlier blocks here. Before arriving at the salt flats, we had to put on heavy duty rubber boots, so we could stand on the water (top-middle).
There is a new activity that is quite popular with Korean tourists, where the driver circles his clients with movie camera and video tapes them while posing at the salt flats, with their reflections (middle-bottom). Ana was a contortionist from Argentina who posed for us (bottom-left and bottom-right). While waiting for the sunset, we shared a bottle of wine, plus snacks. Although Bolivia is in a drought, we were still able to experience the magical salt flats, even though not in the way we had originally envisioned.
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