Ancient Mysteries At The Largest Salt Flats In The World At Uyuni In Bolivia

thank you today we're in the somewhat remote little town of uyuni which is not very attractive as a place to visit but we haven't come here for the town itself we've come here for the amazing uyuni Salt Flats so we drive on the highway for about half an hour outside of town there you can see the edge of the Salt Flats we're at an elevation of

approximately thirteen thousand feet and now the four-wheel drive is starting to move towards the Salt Flats as you can see the terrain is changing we've gone from Sand to a mix of sand and salt and now more salt with some very crude vegetation and now we're actually heading for the Salt Flat itself this road is made of salt so again the terrain is changing more and

more salt is showing up and we're getting to the actual Salt Flats themselves it's the largest salt flat on planet Earth and it's the result of the fact that Lake Titicaca used to be 10 times the size it is now and all the salt shifted down to the southern end because the ultiplano Tilted from the north to the South thousands of years ago and here we

see some little pools bubbling cold salt water actually almost freezingly cold salt water and again you can see the bubbling action okay now we're actually on the Salt Flats itself the darkness of the surface underneath the vehicle is the result of so many cars traveling across it and here's some strange guy in the middle of nowhere as I said the Salt Flat is the largest in

the world and was created because Lake Titicaca was once part of the Pacific Ocean was raised up to an altitude of 13 000 feet then the altiplano Tilted and the result was that all of the salt water headed south and eventually the water evaporated resulting in this deposit of crystal salt which is about as far as I can tell something like at least 10 meters deep

which is over 30 feet this shows you the remoteness or remoteness of the location mountains in the background and also the fascinating hexagonal shape of the encrusted salt in some cases you can see Beyond the Horizon or at least At The Horizon the extent of this huge Salt Flat so after walking around on the surface it's time to get back in and start moving so the

mountains that you see are volcanoes so this shows you an absolutely fascinating landscape of volcanic activity a plate tectonics the ultiplano tilting massive amounts of water shifting and then evaporating this is a one of a two-part video I'm making so stay tuned to part two in another video and now we're approaching an island a volcanic island called incawasi which means the house of the Inca as

we get out of the car you see structures that were made over the course of the last 30 years by one Bolivian individual this is his home and now also has a museum and thousands upon thousands of cactus you see the multiple buildings and now after checking out the sign and description we make our assault and ascent it's a mildly torturous climb but not too difficult

it's about a 25 minute walk up on top of parts of the island giving amazing views eventually of the Salt Flats and passed thousands upon thousands of cactus it's amazing that anything could live in this area because usually there are only three to four months of rainfall but some spectacular views are allowed from different elevations and as we continue walking once again of course you see

many different Cactus at least two or three species of them but the main thing is the vastness of the Salt Flats of uyuni it will be part of upcoming Hidden Inca Tours probably in 2018 or possibly 2019 as extensions of major tours though it is remote this area is only a one hour flight from La Paz Bolivia and La Paz is only a one-hour flight from

our central location of Cusco Our Journey Begins close to the uyuni Salt Flats and we're heading towards ancient cemeteries that we've heard are located in the foreground as you can see the vegetation here is very primitive and very dry area so we go inside this first cave and you can see there's some interesting artifacts inside of it but no actual human remains but then we're guided

towards what looks like a house and is in fact a ceremonial uh Cemetery structure made out of ancient Coral so this was part of an inland sea and prior to that it was part of the Pacific Ocean that got uplifted and here are ancient human remains though generally referred to as the imara culture which actually is represented by the population of the area to this very

day it's more likely that these remains are of the uruchipaya people dating back at least 1 000 years and here is a preserved Puma so as we leave this cemetery and you again you see these amazing Coral formations we're about to head back out onto the flat areas and head towards the actual uyuni Salt Flats or uni being an imara word meaning pen of some kind

not penned as in writing pen but pen as in a pinned in area that may be a mistranslation so here we are on the largest Salt Flats on the planet and our destination is right ahead of us you see the hexagonal shapes in the salt surface and this is an area where they're actually processing the salt they build walls and even houses out of this salt

tanupa or Volcan tanupa which in the imara language means the mountain of the Creator or the mountain of creation it's a huge volcano Rising above the Salt Flats at uyuni and it's here that we're going to explore another cave that supposedly has interesting human remains of antiquity and possibly elongated skulls together so here we are on a very rough Dirt Road in a four-wheel drive heading

up along or onto the flank of sirotanupa and these walls date back at least to Inca times if not older and now you see the Great uyuni Salt Flat in the background so the sign is pointing to chupas momias which means ceremonial towers and arcades containing mummies at least a thousand years old possibly of the imara culture or imara ancestors or maybe the uru chipaya people

so as we walk along this ancient path again in the background you can see that there are walls again going back at least to the time of the Inca or quite possibly even older one or two thousand years old of the imara or uruchipaya people and this is the entrance to the tomb you have to bend over in order to be be able to get inside

here and that is the caretaker there and of course there is it any and then this is our first mummy with black hair it's a complete skeleton has um a somewhat elongated skull as you can see nothing in comparison to the ancient parakas people of the coast of Peru but still an example of cranial deformation dating back at least one thousand if not two thousand years

this gate or this cave has to be locked at night because people for decades have been stealing these skeletons and probably selling them on the black market to people outside of the country again here you can see that it is in fact an elongated skull with black hair and here we have another complete mummy and as we look back at Cerro tanupa and then forward to

the Salt Flats it's time to leave and continue this adventure we're now at another Village located a few miles away from the cave we were just at so we're entering through this quite modern enclosure and we've been told that there is a mummy or two inside of a small cave in this immediate area the man that runs this operation is an old imara man who has

been collecting different stones that appear to be uh looking like different animals and birds what are called similacras they're not carvings themselves they are simply natural formations and this is our first Glimpse inside of the little cave there you see a full mummy in the background a somewhat elongated skull to the right or left side and then here is another mummy with cranial deformation located in

the other corner and this gives you a better View of the skeleton and the elongated skull so that's more or less it for today again we're walking back through this rock garden of natural shapes of stone that appear to look like different animals and a copy of one of the figures in stone found at tiwanaku in Bolivia and now heading back to the hotel on the

long expanse of the uyuni Salt Flats the largest salt flats in the world again you can see the hexagonal design in the surface which of this natural formation and this Salt Flat was created when Lake Titicaca which used to be sea water was 10 times the size that it is now