The next day started with Flamingos. We had seen wild Flamingos before in Mexico and on the Galapagos but we had no idea that they also life on more than 4’000 m. And we would have never expected that they would be the most beautiful we have ever seen. They had beautiful yellow peaks and gorgeous pink feathers. The reason why they are living in this area are the lagoons which are rich in minerals. And the reason why they are pink even though they don’t eat red crabs are the red algae they are consuming.
Those red algae are also the reason why the Laguna Colorada we visited later that day was red. Unfortunately, until then the weather had changed again and the sky had not only turned grey but there was a real snowstorm. But that couldn’t spoil our pleasure, only reduce the time we spent outside of the car. And so, we gave a quick visit to the stone trees and some more lagoons before we arrived at the Sol de Manana Geysers. Even though we were wet and cold we were so fascinated by all the volcanic activity that we couldn’t leave. There were bubbling mud pools, hot water and steam coming off the ground.
The same volcanic activity is also responsible for the hot pool we had in front of our basic accommodation for the night. And as there were no showers, this was a perfect way to wash ourselves and warm up our bodies after a day in the snow.
After the hot bath our new years eve celebrations continued with an operation. My brother had a little accident in the shower one day before he had his flight to Bolivia and now the six stitches had to be removed. And because I like doing new things and my brother completely trusts me, I was the one having the honor to proceed that little operation. Everything went well and so we celebrated even more with Argentinian red wine and Bolivian sparkling wine. But as our day had been quite long, cold and tiring we barely made it past midnight before we all felt asleep.
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