Blogs from Potosí Department, Bolivia, South America - page 136

Potosi at one time in history was one of the world's largest and wealthiest cities, as well as being the highest city in the world. It's no longer so large, but remains the wealthiest city in Bolivia. Why...? Because it has the world's largest silver mine, and if you wear silver there's a good chance it came from here. When we arrived in Potosi, Nik's first concern was seeing the England-Sweden match. We decided on putting our bags at any hostel we could find and then running round to find any place that was showing the football. After the match we walked about the city on our next mission..to book a mine tour. We weren't exactly sure what to expect in the mines or what preparations there were, but it was the main reason we were ... read more

The Border crossing between Argentina and Bolivia at Villazon is amusing. The two countries are connected at this point by a bridge, with immigration offices on both sides. The funny thing is that nobody enforces the people going to Bolivia to enter them, so one can just walk by. This is what happened to me by mistake. When I tried to correct it, I realized that crossing back to Argentina wasn't that simple, but after some explanations I managed to stamp my passport. The border town of Villazon wasn't too inviting, so I took straight away a train to Tupiza, a few hours away. I was expecting Tupiza to be similar to Villazon and the image I had of Bolivia - a 3rd world country with allot of poverty and problems. But actually I found a ... read more

At 4070m Potosi is the highest city in the world; it also has been declared an UNESCO world heritage site since over 2000 colonial buildings have been catalogued there. The city is a maze of narrow paved streets which hide some exceptional 16th and 17th century colonial architecture. The source of the city’s wealth is Cerro Rico, a mountain that dominates the city and which contains vast deposits of silver. Since the state run mines were closed in the 80s, small groups of miners work as cooperatives to extract silver, zinc, tin and lead. Cerro Rico is one of the few working mines in the world where tourists are taken on guided tours; it was one hell of an experience. After being kitted up in overalls, wellingtons and a hard hat we stopped off at a ... read more

Bolivia, un país roto. En Argentina las cosas son baratas y funcionan, en Bolivia más barato aún pero nada funciona. Y esto es mucho decir pero los bolivianos no son la raza más alegre. Haciéndoles justicia ellos no tienen mucho para hacerse sonreír. Llegaron los españoles en los primeros días del siglo 16 y no perdieron tiempo en destruir el Imperio Inca. En 1824, Ganó su independencia Perú de España, mientras Alto Perú permaneció en posesión del imperio español. Un año después, el héroe nacional - y por lo general panamericano - Simón Bolívar envió una fuerza bajo el mandato del general Antonio José de Sucre para obtener su independencia. Alto Perú se convirtió en La República de Bolivia, y Bolívar y Sucre el primer y segundo presidentes respectivamente. Lamentablemente, eso no fue el fin y ... read more

From Potosí we took a very crowded and bumpy, five hour bus journey to Uyuni. The town would be a "middle of nowhere town" if it weren´t for all the Gringos that walk the streets looking for the best-value Land Cruiser tour to the world´s largest salt flats nearby and of course somewhere to feed, water and shelter themselves for a night. No matter where you stay in Uyuni, the nights are so cold that the water in the pipes freezes, leaving you with no running water for morning ablutions. As we stayed in Uyuni for two nights, we cheated the frost on the second day by showering late in the morning and warmed ourselves up before going to bed by sitting next to the fireplace at Los Locos pub (the Bolivian vino tinto and game ... read more