At Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni (Salt Lake), where many families work with salt, a 13-year-old boy named Kunturi lives a traditional Quecha life with his family. His life begins to change when his grandmother dies, a friend moves away and his father takes him on his first trip with the llama caravan. For three months he travels the Ruta de la Sal, exchanging blocks of salt his father and other villagers have chipped from the lake, for other products of the Andes, the altiplano and the valleys. In the snow-covered peaks his father sacrifices Kunturi’s favorite llama. A thief is caught and exiled from a town. Kunturi sees his first armadillo. He learns from these and other experiences and encounters along the way. When the caravan arrives at its destination, the town of Macha where the “Tinku” Festival takes place, Kunturi’s life is changed even more deeply. There he finds Ulala, the most beautiful girl he could imagine. Kunturi and Ulala feel the stirrings of first love as they share the same dream: to run together across the immense white sea that is the Salar de Uyuni, until they reach the end of the horizon.
v PACHAMAMA is a spiritual docudrama set in Bolivia, where a 13-year-old boy lives a traditional life with his family near Uyuni, a salt lake. One spring, he goes with this father on his first caravan. With blocks of salt strapped to their herd of llamas, they travel “The Salt Trail” for several months, exchanging salt for other products of the Andes. He begins to learn who he is as a young man and a Quecha from their many experiences and encounters. As the trip comes to its close, he meets a beautiful girl at a festival in a sacred place of his people. The two young people feel a stirring in their hearts as they share a simple but profound dream: to ride a bicycle together across the salt lake. By the end, he discovers what his grandfather means by “The Gift of Pachamama.”