Our cook fills us up on vegetable soup and a main meal of roast chicken, rice and potato fries. The second day we head south, through sandy desert with occasional teetering rock formations carved by the wind-blown sand. Each shallow valley has its laguna or lake of shimmering saline water inhabited by flocks of graceful pink-breasted flamingos searching for shrimp. Towards dusk we reach Laguna Colorada and its adjacent adobe village offering similar accommodation. Some salt is mined in primitive fashion here and we watch how mud blocks are made and laid to dry in the sun.
Red algae colors the lake shore.
Our guide informs us that next day we have a 4.30am start in order to see a geothermal area at dawn and then cross the frontier to Chile. Near the road a geothermal bore blasts steam to great height. We joined up with four other tour vehicles. Tourists roam the paths around smelly fumeroles and ponds of grey mud plopping away like an evil pot of porridge. Sulfurous steam roars out of vents and geysers of boiling water shoot skyways when least expected - all this activity at 4850m altitude.