On the day of Frankie the guide’s birthday, we had a pancake breakfast at seven-thirty and left the cabin by the hot springs a little after eight o’clock. We veered from the scheduled destination of Laguna Verde by the Chilean border and opted instead for Laguna Negra on our way back to the town of Uyuni. Frankie advised against Laguna Verde because its surface had iced over, obscuring the green coloring it derives from high concentrations of lead, sulfur, and calcium carbonate. So we missed out on this sight as well as that of the Licancabur Volcano that rises 5,960 meters behind the lagoon and is said to have sheltered an Inca crypt at its summit.
It took a while to get to Laguna Negra, and we stopped first in the Salvador Dalí Desert, whose landscape was indeed reminiscent of the surrealist painter’s visions, though he never stepped a foot in this namesake wilderness. Truly, many of the panoramas we beheld conjured up for me kindred works by Dalí or René Magritte and other contemporary artists like Roger Dean. I never thought that what was surreal could be real somewhere! It is, here in the wilderness of the department of Potosí, in Uyuni.
When we reached the edge of Laguna Negra, we left the Toyota Land Cruiser and walked over semi-dry marsh, then hiked up some outcroppings to the cliffs overlooking the lagoon; in all, 20 minutes. Then we exulted in the gorgeous water, black in color for the earth at the bottom of the lagoon. As he did before, Frankie pointed out the dimensions of the lagoon, the altitude where we were, and the mineral deposits that could be seen as salts on the banks of the lagoon. After 15 minutes surveying all we could see from the heights, we descended to the ground and had one final group photo before the lagoon. (No trick shots this time.) Walking back toward the van, I told Barbara from Slovakia that as lovely as the lagoon was, it was disconcerting to me that there should be so little of it. Surely there was much less marsh and much more water in years past, even during the winter, which is the dry season in Bolivia. My fear is that if anthropocentric climate change continues unabated, lagoons like this will vanish for good, along with grand Lago Poopó and even invincible Lago Titicaca, leaving behind much more of the alien arid landscape that we had been marveling at from the privilege of fully hydrated bodies.
It was time to return to smooth paths. To the highways we turned and rambled on for the next few hours with the aim of reaching Uyuni by 5 o’clock in the afternoon. We made a final rest stop mid-afternoon in the mining village of San Cristobal, made relatively prosperous by silver, I believe. In another hour and a half we were back in the town of Uyuni and had disembarked in front of the travel agency. We had already given Frankie a birthday serenade on the cliffs overlooking Laguna Negra. Now each of us gave him a tip in gratitude for getting us there and back again safely, for feeding us, as well as for being companionable and affable with his group.
Feeling justifiably tired and longing for a hot shower to wash the dust out of my hair, eyes, and hands, I went off promptly to Hotel Beliz, a bed-and-breakfast a few blocks south and east from the main street of town. The shower was one of the best I had all year! Having little appetite and a surplus of soda crackers, I simply stayed in the hotel room that evening, munching on crackers and washing them down with the liter of water I had leftover. I prayed a couple of times, read a little, and put out the lights by 9 o’clock. I slept better than I did the previous couple of nights.
Twelve hours later I was sitting in the terminal at the tiny Uyuni airport. My body was there, but I think my soul already went well before me and was waiting for me in Cochabamba. This expedition was good, but it was also good to be over and to return to Convento San Francisco, my relatively permanent place of rest. The journey was good, but it is also good to return to your own company. I do wish that I could have had several of you with me on this tour. But I guess one goes to the desert to be alone, to be alone with God, and that is what I did last week. And I wish I had more time alone with God in the desert. Something to resolve for the years to come.
I hope I have been able to show you a little of the glory I saw, heard, smelled, tasted, and touched in Uyuni. Sometimes I feel I do not concentrate very well on looking and listening. Ah, help me more, Holy Spirit, next time. Reveal the quiet majesty of the Holy One behind, within, and beyond all that exists. Grant me the experience and grant me the meaning and grant me the memory. Help me to find you, dear God, in all things that are bright and beautiful, and let me never take them for granted. Amen.
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