The Salar de Uyuni, a sea of salt, a salt desert, was once an inland sea, or giantsalt water lake, but the water vanished into the thin dry air of Andean altitude. All that remains is the salt, tens of meters thick, lying stark beneath bright sky: a sun-bleached skeleton of a dead sea.
The 4085 square mile salt flat looks like a scene from another planet. The endless sea of white salt is paired with small islands, which are small rocky hills of earth cluttered with odd plants such as cacti. The flats were once part of a large lake more than 40,000 years ago.
Most tourists that visit the site will go on a jeep tour that lasts 2-4 days and often combines trips to colored lakes, rare rock formations, and other unusual stops. The town Uyuni, where most of the tour operators and jeep tour activity are based, is built up solely for trips into this barren wasteland. At the end of the tour many are left of at the Chilean or Argentine borders to continue a long journey, or return they spend an extra day to return to Uyuni.
