Salt Lakes Tour

HOLA
Just got off our 3day salt lakes tour. It was Amazing!! Went from San Pedro de Atacama in the top of chile where we did a tour around the Vale de la Luna = Valley of the Moon. It was in an area, canyon of the desert that looked identiacal to the moon. THere was a giant Perfecto sand dune that we climbed to watch the sunset and the Andes change colour with the setting sun.
The 3day tour began with 3 lakes one white, one green and one red. We saw heaps of flamengos and llamas. and then 4 more lakes and hundreds of crazy random as volcanic rocks.. one looked like a tree.. its called the stone tree. The drive was in 4wds and it was true 4wdriving! sitting in the back you were thrown all over the place. We got 2 flat tires on day 2 and they were changed in less than 4mins! Today was the best day we staying in a hotel on the edge of the salar de uyuni(salt lake of uyuni) , which was completely made of salt.. walls.. floor.. tables.. chairs. We got up at 5:30am walked 15min out onto the lake and watched the sun come up at the edge of miles and miles of salt. The day was spent driving across this lake.. pristine white everywhere.. white as far as you could see in all directions! A crazy visual experiance. We stopped at an island which was covered in cacti and had been inhabited since the time of the incas. We are all sunburt cos the salt worked like snow and was very reflective.. for all you medders.. the salt is formed in hexagonal shapes.. just like liver cells!
We are now in Uyuni.. we were going to stay one night here but it smells like poos and wees so we are on the next bus to Potosi, 200 km away.. 6hours in a bus! We will do the famous mine tour there tomo and then head up to La Paz which is supposed to be very very cool.
We just checked our exam marks.. All Passed so we are off for a cerveza in the sun (beer)
chao for now.
Em, Megan, Sarah

desert

Hola!
we have spent 3 days and a total of 24 hours on a bus drivin on the dead straight Panamerican highway in the Chilean Desert ... imagine the view, it doesn´t change. Was great to see the country though, and met some interesting people along the way, and stayed in some nice beach towns. Food is crap. Unless you want to pay heaps, but we´re too stingy, so ate barros luco (steak and cheese and nothing else sammy) everyday for 4 days. now in San pedro de atacama, the Queenstown of chile. it´s amazing, alledgedly an oasis in the driest desert in the world. ridiculously hot, but food is so much better. last night we went to a concert in the plaza de armas (town square) where they played amazing chilean music, with mad as percussion. we danced with dirty old chilean men with dreads, bob Marley is still alive by the way, the proof is coming when we can get photos organised. Had a big night at our hostel, realised we should go to bed when the sun came up and the roosters started crowing. we don´t think the other hostel residents like us much anymore. not to worry, we´re crossing the border into bolivia tomorrow morning, to tour aroud some lagoons and salt lakes ... more soon. Apparently Amazing race is in town today, so we´re going to sniff that out.
photos coming soon. adios.
ps ... task 1, phase 1 (chile) complete. task 2 complete. no comments please.

Santiago

Explored Santiago city by foot, climbed the hill in the center of the city Santa Lucia.. to see a great view of the city. You can´t see the borders of it in any horizon and surrounded by mountains. City is very smoggy, can´t see stars and the sky isn´t very blue. Had a vry entertaining evening drink 1L bottles of local beer with some Auzzie and french boys and an english couple. outside on the patio at our hostel. Went into town and ended up in a bar with a big sign on the door saying "Smoking Only"!! it was disguisting.. it was very quiet untill we got there and just before we left the entire bar started loudly singing along to some spanish death metal! it was hillarious. We completely lost track of time and number of beers and stumbled home at 5:30 to get less than an hours sleep before we had to catch the bus to La Serena.. we slept though our alarm and woke 15min before the taxi was to arrive.. speed packing with two of us blind we got in the taxi.. got to the station.. got out.. wrong station! we had 15 to make it to the next station which was about 2 metro stops away, we thrust 1000 pesos at this old man who just had a women get out of his car.. his wife? when we got in we found out it Was a taxi.. thank god! got to the station and megan only saw trains.. found the buses poped an antinausea each and off we went on our 6 hour bus ride!
Spent the afternoon at the beach.. was fantastic!
Now it is sleep time.
Hasta la vista

Upgrade!

hey peeps, writing from Santiago, Chile. Arrived at 5ish last night, have had a few language difficulties, but nothing we can´t mime our way through! Anyway, onto much more inportant news- we got an upgrade to Business Class! Emily was amazing, saying that because our flight had been delayed and we were inconvenienced and our agent had organised it for us, they had no idea about any of it, but gave us the upgrade. So on we got with our trackies and backpacks, they didn´t know what to think of us! 3 course meal was amazing and took over an hour, all the champagne and juice we could drink. Sensational. We also got a thrill when they asked three times if there was a doctor on the plane, and thought that we might have to be called on! nothing eventuated though. Gutted. Have met people and had a quick look around Santiago last night, we´re heading off for a big day exploring. Adios Amigos!

Day Zero!

~In Auckland at johnny scotters. fantastic evening with view of sky tower -check out the photo, shows the entire night...

love e, s, m.

Hi, and welcome to the blog we've set up for our trip to South America! We're done with Med School for the year and are off on Thursday 16th to spend the summer galavanting round South America so stay tuned to check out photos and stories of what we've been up to.