It’s a gentle start to the day as our bus to Potosi is at 10.00. After a breakfast of avocado, marmalade and a roll (which was much nicer than it sounds! Dan went shopping, his excuse nothing was open, we think he just has weird taste buds) we headed back to the Atacama Mistica office as the nice lady there has offered to walk us to the bus.
The bus is OK but a bit of a downgrade from what we’ve been used to in Chile, although once we set off it is clear why – the ‘main’ road to Potosi is mostly a rutted dusty track, we reminisce about the Route 40. It’s not long before we are swinging around mountain switch-backs with traffic passing on all sides – it’s time to focus on some Spanish lessons đŸ˜‰
Apart from the somewhat hairy ride, the scenery is spectacular with great views back to the Salar de Uyuni, traversing through amazing gorges as well as getting an insight to rural Bolivia.
As there was no wifi in Uyuni we have no accommodation booked in Potosi so when we get off the bus we bundle into a couple of taxis to go into the centre of town to track down some options.
The 1st one has space for the five of us so we take it. Note to self: check out what’s on offer before accepting!!! The bathrooms were pretty grotty!!! The communal space was ok and a basic brekkie was thrown in. The room we had could really do with a bit of TLC too but the sheets were clean.
After settling our bags in we all went for a stroll into the town square where we’d read there was a miniature statue of liberty. Then we went to what seemed like a Bolivian fast food cafe – popular with the locals so we thought it was worth a go, and it was ok.
It wasn’t a late night as we were pretty done from being at altitude again – Potosi is the highest city in the world at ~ 4,200m!!!