When visiting the Salar de Surire starting from Putre, plan in a full day trip. The drive itself will take 4 hours on the A325 for one direction. Surrounding the whole lake will take 1 1/2 – 2 hours, including photo stops.
The Salar de Surire is a salt lake that houses many animals huge herds of llamas and alpacas. The views on the lake and the surroundings are stunning and it is worth to go there.
At the beach of the Salar de Surire the Polloquere Hot Springs can be found. In case you plan some swimming be aware that some parts are burning hot. I only wanted to go in with my feet and I burnt them. Be aware the lighter the blue in the spring the hotter is the water in that area.
As the drive on the A-235 was not that impressive we though we take another way back to Putre over tiny Anden towns. The idea was great and the drive itself had much more great views and authentic Andes feeling but the streets were in bad conditions which made the drive endless. The route was planned like this: Polloquere to Umirpa to Tignamar to Putre. This took us alone 7 hours and the last 3 hours we drove in the dark, which is completely not recommendable. We were even stopped by the police, which wanted to know what we are doing out at night, who we are and where we are going. All in Spanish of course.
So plan your trip carefully and start early, in order enjoy this adventure.
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