Isla del Pescado

Isla del Pescado, shaped like a floating fish, is located in the center of the huge salt desert of Uyuni in the south of the Altiplano plateau in Bolivia. The area of Uyuni salt marsh is 10,000 square kilometers, and the area of Isla del Pescado is about 2 square kilometers. It's a small grain of sand in an ocean of salt. The island is the top of an ancient volcano covered with volcanic tuff and rises above the salt surface of the desert a little more than 100 meters, the length of the island is 2.5 km, and the width reaches 1.3 km.

On the island grow giant cacti, whose height reaches 10-12 meters. Cacti live a long time, some of them are more than 1000 years old. You can determine the age of the cactus by its height, since the cactus grows only 1 centimeter per year. Before the start of the rainy season in September-October, cacti are covered with large yellow-white flowers. On the island there are several archaeological sites associated with the ancient civilization of Tiahuanaco, as well as the ruins of Inca settlements.