Abstract We demonstrate that, under ideal circumstances, passive optical measurements can yield surface water depth estimates with an accuracy of a few centimeters. Our target area is the Salar de Uyuni, in Bolivia. It is a large, active salt flat or playa, which is maintained as an almost perfectly level and highly reflective surface by annual flooding, to a mean depth of 30–50 cm. We use MISR data to estimate spatial and temporal variations in water depth during the waning portion of the 2001 flooding cycle. We use a single ICESat laser altimetry profile to calibrate our water depth model. Though the salt surface is probably the smoothest surface of its size on Earth, with less that 30 cm RMS height variations over an area of nearly 104 km2, it is not completely featureless. Topography there includes a peripheral depression, or moat, around the edge of the salt, and several sets of prominent parallel ridges, with 5 km wavelength and 30 cm amplitude. The process by which these features form is still not well characterized.