Who knew that choreographed, sequined dancing men could be so hot?

 In the begining...

 The parade starts at 6 am and ends at 5 am.  Needless to say, I did not make it the whole time :)

 Who is ready to drink and light flares?? Me!

 Um, do you think I could get this for next Halloween?

 Current picture.  Taken in Humahuaca, Argentina.  Yep, I tested.  The cactus is real.

Fighting for freedom statue.  The picture doesn{t show how awesome the statue really is!

Well...made it to Argentina, finally!  Carnival was amazing.  I didn{t know what to expect and I got amazing dancers, bright costumes, contagious giddiness and one hell of a production!  The amount of beer and liquor consumed by the crowd and some of the dancers was also baffling.  I think one of the funniest drunks I saw was a tuba player.  He was being escorted out of the parade (because he could barely walk straight) and while being lead into the crowd he tried to breathe and instead gave a big ole blow into his tuba.  There was an unsuspecting man caught right in the path and he almost fell over from the sound.  Awesome.
The amount of energy at this event was electric.  The dancers would put on a show ten fold and the crowd would play right back.  Dancing, singing, foam, water, and beer were ever prestent.  Not once on the first day did I sit down in the bleachers.  I didn{t stay too long at night nor did I drink too much.  Super sick and just now getting better.  Getting to Humahuaca was, well, interesting.  I waited 3 days for a bus that would finally take me to the border of Argentina and then from there I needed another to this town.  I came here because I thought there was sandboarding (decided not because I still don{t feel well). Our bus was creeping along until the sky started to get dark and they pulled over to the side of the road, in the middle of nowhere, and told me to get out.  Um, what? I got my things, put my pack on and the bus man told me to walk over yonder. Imagine pointing into the middle of nothing, that was my destination. The dark sky looked like it was going to open up any minute and poor. 
Ok.  Walk fast.
Walking anywhere in particular was not really in my plans.  Dirt roads, nobody in sight, lots of houses.  I was now just thinking that maybe I could hide in a dark corner and pitch my tent :)  I started to see some random people here and there and asked where a hostel was.  Got a few conflicting replies and eventually I was directed down a million stairs in which at the bottom I could hear music. I stopped and tried to pinpoint where it was coming from. I followed where I thought it was and found cobblestone streets with very pleasent people.  Super excited I didn{t have to stay the night sleeping in my tent, sitting up with my swiss army knife :) Today is the first time (in over a week) I haven{t gotten sick more than once in a day and I have been able to eat! In celebration I am drinking an Argentinan beer :) Salud!  Carnival is here too.  There is a small parade circling around town with costumes, bands and all.  I don{t want any more foam in my face or body so I am staying clear.  

Last I got sprayed by two little kids.  Girl had can of foam and boy had the water gun.  I nodded a no to them and walked past.  The girl giggled and shot my back.  The boy ran after me and got me with the water gun.  I turned around and kicked a puddle of water at him.  Totally got him!  Ah, fun :) 

Since the video doesn´t work... more pictures!

Llama glory.  There were tons and our guide needed to let us out so he could drive across a river without flooding the car.  I tried to ride one but it was frowned upon....Poor sports!

This isn´t the picture I wanted but flamingos just the same. And it takes too much time to change! These flamingos were in the hundreds in cold, snowy weather.  I thought they only liked palm trees!

I got to ride on the top of the car on the way back.  It was beautiful. Salar de Uyuni.  All salt and it mirrors perfectly.  Our guide said he can´t sleep the night after driving because the glare is so vicious!  yuck

My friend :)  I brought dinos as props for my group but 3 of the group inspired such distaste I didn´t talk to them and the other 2 didn´t understand how to shoot a camera. (yes, bitter!)  So, here is my friend flying solo!

Still loving Bolivia!

Salar de Uyuni tour.  Stunning.  I don´t think it was possible to take a bad picture.  It is the worlds largest salt flat at 12106 sp km.  We slept at 4200 meters, you know, the same kind of altitude you wake up out of breath...same ole same ole.  This place puts out 20k tons of salt, and has both museums and hotels completly made out of salt. The water was slightly warm, only 5 inches at its deepest and left a layer of sparkle on your skin afterwards :)

 Potosi.
This was one of the riches and largest cities of the world around 1670; bigger than Paris or London.  Silver mines have been used since 1544 and rumor has it that the amount of silver that has been extracted is enough to build a silver bridge to Spain.  This wealth lead to over 8 million deaths between 1545 to 1825 under Spanish colonial rule with 12 hour shifts and no saftey concerns.
We had about 1.5 hours down there with lots of gasses, small spaces and sparkling dirt everywhere. It was a weird tour.  Glad I did it but don´t know if I liked it or not. Ever seen the documentary The Devil´s Miner? 

I am totally dominating this rock!!!  More of the Salar tour.  It was 3 days and we also went to see some GIANT geysers that smelled like egg (sulfer?) and then ended the trip in a hot-springs pool.  It was super hot and felt amazing with snow-capped mountains in the background.  Wasn´t bubbling but there were pads that did have water coming out, like a low energy hot-tub :)  Very nice.

Carnival is a next in Oruro.

Toro Toro, you are the gem of my world!

So many stories.  The bus ride to Toro Toro was horrendous.  I wasn´t sure if any of it was worth it when:  I didn´t have enough room to cross my arms but I did have an old woman sitting on my lap, pig pen and his family crammed to my left, a oddly sticky woman and her kid sitting in the aisle next to me, chickens above me, clamped shut window, a 6 hour layover and someone who smelled like pee and sausage.  And then I got to Toro Toro.  AMAZING!!!!! There is a dinosaur statue (think Universal Studio type) that is their main plaza.  I couldn´t stop smiling. I saw:

It is so calming to see light after shuffling around in the dark for an hour!  My guide is the light on the bottom.  Umajalanta Cave

I´ve found the Great Valley!  How cool are dino footprints????  I love it! There were so many :)

I am shimming on my belly through this crack for about 20 feet.  Anyone seen the movie Decent? That´s all I could think.

This waterfall litterally took my breath away.  It was perfect.  So refreshing.  So rewarding!

Now, of course it can´t all be peaches and cream...  The first day I went for a hike seeing 7 different sites and ended up walking/hiking for 8 hours.  It was my dream and I loved it! Walking in a beautiful landscape my guide led me to a totally unexpected canyon.  It was like a mini grand canyon.  Stunning. We hiked down (where the waterfalls were) and then on the way back we decided to take an alternate route rather than the 930 steps back up. Sweet.  I like adventure, right?  The guide asked if I was scared of heights and if I minded getting a little wet because we would be walking along the river. 

For those of you who remember me talking about how hard the 3 Sisters Waterfalls hike was, that was childsplay! First I thought wow, I am impressed that he thinks I am capable of hiking like this, and second, I am impressed I can do it! This was full body hiking. All apendages needed. Scaling walls, jumping, and lots of balance.

Then came that jump.

My guide is flying across everything in his path and even this jump looked hard.  But, obviously, he made it.  Standing from a small part of one boulder, I needed to jump off another smooth and steep boulder to make it to the third more flat boulder where I could stand.  The second one had nothing to hold on to and was at such an incline it was impossible not to jump.  Quicksand type mud was below, not an option.  So, knowing I had little traction in my shoes, I decided to go for it.  Can´t wait too long or I would have never done it.  Live only once, right? :)  Can anyone guess what happened?  :)   My arms were spread out; one holding on to the side of the rock I was jumping from and the other ready to grasp at the last rock. I lept thinking the hardest part was just to jump, and this is such a bad ass hike!  Well, my shoe didn´t put up much of a fight and I slid right off that boulder. The first thing to hit was my face against the boulder.

Well, didn´t really see that coming. First thing is first, holy crap, is my jaw broken? No.  Do I have all my teeth? Yes. Ouch.  I am sinking further and further into the mud. My poor guide is hysterical.  He helps me up and is worring about the bloody welt developing on my knee and keeps asking if I am ok. ¨Me cara, es me cara.¨  He looks up and gasps.  Then pushes on my cheek.  Liquid leaks out (not blood) and it continues to for the next 20 min.  Glad he did that cause it helped with swelling. I convinced him that it was ok to continue and with a few tears dried, on we went! The rest was amazing.  The next day was a cave where all I could think of is ´they really let tourist do this?´ Slidding in the dark, holes, boulders, ropes, ladders, tiny cracks to climb through (with difficulty!).  It was AWESOME! The bus ride back was SO much better and because of the rain we had 4 road blocks.  A few was from landslides and we needed to break the rock apart to clear the road,  Others were washed out road so we needed to put rocks in the water so  the bus could pass.  I helped :)  Got muddy, in my only clean pants!  Now off to Santa Cruz! Hope you all are doing well and haven´t been punched in the face with rock! :)  Ahh, good times :)  It is funny, really, just think about it.

Do you see a path here? Neither do I. Scale the sides!  None of the rocks in the middle are close enough to jump.  Welcome to the hike