The Salar de Uyuni tour is Bolivia's main draw. Although I've met plenty of people who love Bolivia, who've happily worked or volunteered in the country, I also met people on this tour coming from Argentina, Peru and Chile who came solely to see the "white deserts and colored lakes" and planned to leave again right afterwards.

Bolivia certainly deserves greater consideration—and after my measly two weeks there I'm already imagining what I could do there in two months—but the Salar de Uyuni tour earns every bit of the hype. In four days we covered painted mountains, windswept deserts, red lakes; we spotted vicunas, bizcochos and flamingos; and ran around the biggest salt flat in the world.

At 4085 square miles, the Salar de Uyuni is about 25 times the size of the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. Possibly the flattest place I've ever seen, the salt lake lies at 3650 meters above sea level nestled among mountains. The Salar dwarfs everything else in the area, most especially the tourists. It is so large that in the center the horizon disappears, leaving nothing but alien landscape.

The tour is more than just one highlight of course... driving through the mountains of South America's highest country is a thrill in and of itself. Seeing various lakes colored by their unusual mineral contents and the stunning eroded landscape around Tupiza will remain among my favorite travel memories. Sometimes all the other tourists are doing something because it's absolutely worth doing.

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