South America (Part 4) - Bolivia

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La Paz

So on June 28th we flew from Santiago to La Paz, very early, leaving the hostel at 4am. El Alto airport is situated at over 4000m, but La Paz city itself is down in the valley so you immediately go down some 500m to reach it, seeing great views of the city on the way. We knew the altitude was going to affect us (La Paz is the highest capital in the world) so we headed some advice I´d read online not to drink any alcohol for a couple of days before and after. I might as well had not bothered as I spent the next 4 days with excruciating headaches in the morning and shortness of breath. Apparently our change of plans to fly into La Paz was a very bad idea.

Anyway, we arrived into a different world in Bolivia. Our experience of South America so far of Argentina, Chile and Uruguay was very much of a developed region, not much different from anywhere in Europe. On arrival in Bolivia we immediately saw the women in ethnic dress, the old cars and cool old buses. Very much the ´real´ South America. The good thing as well with being less developed was that everything was much much cheaper, which would be better on our dwindling bank accounts.

So given the effect the altitude on me (Patrick seemed to be completely unaffected, typical) we didn´t actually do a lot in La Paz. Luckily the football was still on which kept Patrick amused enough. Most of it we watched in the hostel except the first game which we watched in Oliver´s travels, supposedly an English pub managed by the weirdest maddest English man (we now found out actually owned by the same guy as our hostel I´m now sitting in in Arequipa, Peru). We also managed some quite nice lunches, oriental and indian. Yes, very Bolivian. But all the tourist restaurants did these 3 course set lunches for about 3 quid so we took the opportunity to splurge!

The one day we did actually do something was on our last day. We had to go to one of the private clinics recommended by the hostel to get a 4 week x-ray of Patrick´s arm, which went pretty smoothly, immediately on arrival being greated by an English speaking doctor which is a first in South America for us. He also made us an appointment with a specialist who we´d see later on to give another opinion on Patrick´s arm (the arm is healing and the plates etc are all fine, but will be another 6 weeks or so before the bone has fused).

X-rays done we headed back to the city centre and visited the Coca Museum. Coca leaves have been part of Andean history for years, being chewed for centuries (including during the Inca period) for it´s health benefits including help with the altitude, digestion and providing energy for the hard graft the Andeans had to do in those days (more on that later in Potosi). Of course coca leaves are also the basic ingredient for cocaine (something like 250 grams of coca leaves are used to make a gram of cocaine) and the museum showed some quite interesting info on the making of cocaine and some stats. The stat that stuck with me most is that the USA has only 5% of the world´s population, yet consumes 50% of the world´s cocaine. Bolivia (and other countries in South America) don´t actually have most of the chemicals that are used to make cocaine so that stuff is actually imported to the jungle factories that exist for this purpose. Bolivia has tried to establish a special branch of the police to crack down on the production of cocaine, but I guess it´s probably too hard to stop it all unfortunately. I also didn´t know that Coca-Cola actually used to have cocaine in, a practice that stopped in 1903. In addition, cocaine was used as an anaesthetic and actually to this day is still allowed to be produced legally by certain countries for medicinal use. Wouldn´t some people love to know where those factories are (including in Britain by the way)?!

So anyway, back to the chewing of coca leaves which is legal in Bolivia as it is effectively just a herb. It is also used to make tea which is recommended for the altitude sickness, and therefore the start of my drinking coca tea which I have been continuing throughout this high altitude region. I actually quite like it now but I don´t think you can get it outside the Andean region as they don´t really have the ability to export it in big quantities (except of course to for Coca-Cola production!).

We also wandered around some of the hilly streets including the ´witches market´ which isn´t really as exciting as it sounds, but somewhere you can buy lots of weird stuff including Llama foetus´ which is apparently good luck if you´re building a new house. Given we won´t be doing that for a while we passed in buying one.

The rest of La Paz isn´t really all that pretty but we quite liked the city anyway for the atmosphere of it all. The traffic of course was horrendous with the thousands of ´collectivos´driving around, which were basically minibuses advertising different destinations that you can pick up anywhere, and especially during rush hour were packed to the roof.

So then came July 1st and to my relief the day we would fly to Sucre and get down to 2,500m which hopefully would resolve my headaches. After hearing about the Bolivian roads (with their lack of asphalt) we decided to pass on the 14 hour bus journey (oh yeah, no toilets on the buses either, I´ve been spoilt by the Chilean and Argentinian plush buses) and fly the 45 minutes instead.

Sucre

So after our nice flight we arrived at lunch time to a lower altitude Sucre. Sucre was the administrative and political centre of Bolivia during Spanish rule (due to it´s position near Potosi, again more on that later), and is still officially the capital of Bolivia, although it´s really now just an honorary position given La Paz is now the economic centre and where congress and the presidency reside. Given it´s history, Sucre therefore has many old colonial buildings and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1991. You could immediately feel and see the difference from La Paz with it´s lovely tree lined streets and squares and beautiful buildings.

Luckily it was a nice town to hang around in, as following my stint with the altitude sickness I was obviously run down and managed then to come down with a bad cold in Sucre. We weren´t doing very well in Bolivia it seemed. Of course Patrick was still well (ok apart from a broken arm). So our planned 3 days in Sucre turned into 5, and again we didn´t do a lot! Luckily there was still football on so at least Patrick could watch all of it without being dragged round more churches.

Before I came down with the cold (probably flu really?!) we managed to walk around the town a little bit, and walked up the hill to the Recoleta area which provided great views over Sucre and the surrounding countryside. We then (after a nice lunch with the views) went to Casa de la Libertad in the main square, which was originally a seventeenth century Jesuit Univerisity but renamed ´Liberty House´as the Bolivian act of independence was signed on August 6, 1825. It was a beautiful building and housed lots of interesting memorabilia from those times including apparently the first Argentinian flag (all the South American countries battled against Spanish rule at the same time), although some other tourists on the guided tour were told the first flag was in Argentina somewhere (of course).

That night we ate at a small little local restaurant, which resulted in us having bad stomachs the next day. So now totally fed up with being ill I went to the doctor to load up on lots of drugs including antibiotics for my stomach and anti-altitude pills. The doctor visit cost me 2 quid, I should have gone earlier!

So after a couple of days with some drugs in the system we were ready finally to move on. So with another couple that had also been holed up in the hostel because of being ill on July 6th we got a taxi to Potosi. It obviously cost a bit more than the local bus but saved us from faffing around getting to the bus station etc. The scenery was quite something during the 3 hour journey winding up through the hills to finally reach the antiplano and Potosi.

Potosi

Potosi is at 4,100m, and is the highest city in the world, hence my reluctance to go there until I was better. We were completely unaware of it´s history which is extraordinary. The city was built around Cerro Rico (´Rich Mountain´) as silver was discovered here in 1545 and was quickly taken over by the Spaniards. Over the next 20 years the new city of Potosi became the richest single source of silver in the world, and its population grew to over 100,000 making it the largest city in the Americas. By the beginning of the seventeenth century the population of Potosi was over 160,000, and was bigger and richer than London or Paris. However, the working conditions in the mines of Cerro Rico were appalling with the indigenous workers and slaves being made to work for weeks down in the dark. The estimates are that over 8 million people died in the mines over the years, generally from lung issues from the toxic dusts in the mines. However, as with all mines the amount of minerals dwindled such that the population of Potosi fell to just 9,000 by the independence of Bolivia in 1825. Today the mines are still operational but mostly for tin, although there is still a tiny amount of silver left. The conditions in the mines haven´t improved much over the years with miners having tough lives grafting in the mines and having a short life expectancy of about 40 years generally due to silicosis.

The thing to do in Potosi was to visit the mines but given I´d been ill I thought I´d better not (because of the dust etc). We´d heard stories that you had to crawl through sections and go up and down on ladders so we didn´t know if Patrick would be able to do that one handed. However the guy on the front desk of the hostel said he´d be ok so Patrick booked himself on the tour the next day.

That night we watched the film ´The Devil´s Miner´ which was made 5 years ago by some Germans about a 14 year old boy who had to work in the mines as his father had died when he was young so he had to support the family. It was a pretty good documentary going through the history of the mines, and the beliefs of the miners (they pray to ´Tio´ being the devil as they believe God helps you in the outside world but that only Tio can keep you safe in the mines). There are over 800 children working in the mines, many of which will probably continue to do so for their whole (short) lives. Based on this film I changed my mind and decided to go on the tour the next day.

So the next morning we gathered at the hostel with 20 others to don our protective clothing (over trousers, jacket, wellies, hat and headlamp) to visit the mines. First we stopped at the Miners Market where we bought some coca leaves and juice for the miners. Since about the 1990´s the mines have actually been owned by miners themselves through co-operatives and the amount of minerals they extract barely feeds them so tourists are asked to buy the necessities for them. As mentioned before, coca leaves provide energy and they also suppress hunger, so they have been chewed by the miners for centuries. Next we visited a small shop that recharge miners´ headlamp batteries and also sell dynamite and the detonators. We were told the dynamite itself was harmless which was demonstrated by the guy lighting the stuff, and would only actually explode when used with the more dangerous detonator. So again we all bought some dynamite and detonators for the miners. Next we drove up to Cerro Rico and to the entrance of one of the mines. I was right to think that I wouldn´t be able to go into the mines as within about 100 yards of walking (more crouching) very quickly down the shafts trying to keep up with the guide I was very breathless and my chest felt tight also from the dust so I decided I didn´t want to go any further and turned back. Patrick very nicely came with me, although it transpired that actually after a couple of minutes the group reached a ladder which they had to climb down to get to the next level, and we were assured that Patrick wouldn´t have been able to do that bit anyway. On the way out though we saw the mine´s statue of Tio (every mine has one) where the miners stop to pray and provide payment for safe passage in the mines in the form of coca leaves and alcohol. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the alcohol that the miners drink, which is 90% proof. Seriously if someone hadn´t have told me I swear it was to be used for cleaning wounds rather than drinking.

So having got back to the fresh air (kind of, there was still a lot of dust around) we had to wait 90 minutes for the group to come back out. 10 minutes later we were joined by another girl who didn´t want to go further, which made me feel a bit better!

However, in that time we watched as different groups of 3 miners brought out the big metal carts full of minerals and rock to dump down the side of a hill to load onto trucks. Their system seemed so archaic as the carts were manually pushed on wooden rails that would cause the carts quite regularly to be derailed. And full carts were very very heavy! We saw some young boys doing this work as well and I don´t think I´ve seen any work before that so clearly makes you realise how privileged we are to have been born in a western country.

Towards the end of our wait a young man came to the mine who was none other than the boy that was in the film we saw the previous night. He is actually now a guide with one of the local tour companies and learns English in the evenings. Good to see that at least one kid got out anyway. He however still lives on the mountain as apparently didn´t really get paid very much by the film company.

So once we were joined again by the rest of the group we went up the hill to blow up some dynamite. Obviously safety for tourists hasn´t quite reached South America! They lit the fuse and passed it around the group for a few minutes before running off with it to place it about 100 yards away. It was a pretty big boom! Not sure we´ll ever experience that again.

After the mines Patrick went to watch Spain vs Germany in one of the local cinemas! We then rushed down to the Casa Real de La Moneda, the Royal Mint, for the last tour of the day. It was built between 1759 and 1773 and operated as the second Royal Mint in the city. It now is a museum with art from the period and also some of the original machinery used to make the coins, including the massive machinery operated by horses (connected by big cogs and wheels) which flattened the silver ready for the coins. The building itself was also quite impressive and very well maintained.

Because Potosi was so prosperous there were a lot of grand colonial buildings in the town. A lot of tourists come to Potosi just for the mines tour and only spend a day or two here, as we would. But really I thought there was a lot more history and places to visit here than even Sucre or La Paz. However given we´d lost a bit of time because I was ill we had to keep moving and booked the bus to go to Uyuni the next day.

The bus itself was only 7 pounds but we´d heard it wasn´t a very nice journey so we investigated getting a private transfer, we were quoted $180 so we passed on that and braced ourselves for the journey.

At 11am we boarded the bus which was actually in pretty good condition with good leg room, we have seen worse. For the first hour we had asphalt roads so covered 60km pretty quickly we thought, but then the road ran out and we hit the dirt. The next 140km would take another very bumpy 5 hours with one short stop in the middle to go to the toilet (where there were no toilets anyway). Half way through we also started picking up passengers although we had a full bus. So by the end there were people stood up all the way down the aisle. Some of the gringos were very gracious and gave up their seats for the locals to sit down, one guy was stood up for 3 hours! The journey was ok but felt about 3 hours too long. With that, we ended up in Uyuni.

Uyuni

We were originally planning to arrive in Uyuni and spend the next day looking around at tours for the Salar de Uyuni (salt flats) but on arrival that evening we decided to spend as little time there as possible. Also the World Cup final was on the 11th and we found out that we could get to San Pedro de Atacama in Chile by lunchtime so we´d be there in time for it if we left the next day. The railway town (the train runs from the border with Argentina up towards La Paz) isn´t known for much except as a jumping off point for the salt flats and there isn´t much to the dusty town in the middle of nowhere. The salt flats tour is one of the most difficult (I think) to book as the tour companies don´t actually own their own jeeps or drivers, so it´s very much pot luck as to what you get and blogs and forums on the internet reflect just that. So when we walked into a tour operator (Expediciones Foriner & Adventure) and there were 2 Portugese guys singing their praises and those of the driver who supposedly was to be taking the tour the next day, we immediately booked it with that company. The woman at the tour company told us there would be the driver, Mario, with a nice comfortable jeep, and we would be joining 2 english couples to have a maximum of 6 passengers in the car. Ha! I guess we live and learn as the next day we waited at the company´s office from 10am which was supposed to be where we´d get picked up at 10.30 (we got there early to ask some questions about the border stamps). 10.30 came and went and we were wondering whether we´d been completely done but finally the woman turned up at 10.45 and said the driver was just picking up the other people from their hotel. Mmmm. So another 45 minutes later and finally a jeep turned up, turfed a girl out to join another tour and we got in the jeep with the 5 other passengers. Ok we thought, we´ll just get on with it and went to our first stop, which turned out to be Colchani, not the first stop of the train cemetary we were expecting. The train cemetary is just supposed to be an area where they have dumped old trains leaving them to corrode but meant you could climb all over the things. Well not a huge big deal but we were looking forward to seeing it, so not a good start to our tour. It transpired that the others in the jeep had just literally been there and were told that we were having breakfast so came to pick us up after!! What a load of cobblers. Again yet another point about the tour companies is that they put people from different tour companies together into a jeep and it turned out we were with people that had booked with the company down the road that we were originally going to go to (Expediciones Lipez) before we were sucked in by the Portugese guys (I wonder if they got some payment!).

Anyway, I´ll stop banging on about the tour company as the rest of the tour was actually very good and we enjoyed it very much. So after Colchani we headed into the salar (salt flats) itself. The salt flats are huge at about 11,000 square kms, being the largest salt flats in the world, created by rising and falling sea levels (or something like that, you can google it!). It´s quite something driving across the flats, even when following quite a few jeeps going the same way it just seems so vast. We stopped at the first salt hotel built (made obviously from salt in blocks) briefly then headed to Incahuas Island, covered with massive cactus, where we had lunch and took the obligatory silly photos. From there (after swapping jeeps, I´ll save you the details) we headed a bit away from the rest of the tours to some caves with interiors that I´d never seen before, looking like moonscapes, created again by the rising and falling sea levels and volcanic activity. In the same site there was a burial cave of the Chullpas who were apparently an indigenous population who lived by the moon rather than the sun, and also some great views from the top of the hill. Very cool place and there were only 2 other jeeps there (compared with about 30 at the previous stop). We then headed to our salt hotel for the night, again off the beaten track and completely isolated. The hotel was fantastic, built with stone on the bottom half and salt blocks on the top, filled with salt block tables and chairs. Very cool. We had it to ourselves for an hour or so before another group joined us, but apparently the rest of the groups stayed at another salt hotel that would be rammed, so we were quite lucky in the end.

The next morning was an early start at 6.30am to continue south through many different stops of weird formations of rocks, stone, great views, lakes etc in the Reserva Eduardo Avaroa. Every stop was something different and cool to see but there were quite long drives through desert on the way. Early on we had to stop to change one of the tyres which the driver did in 5 minutes flat. But then we had to rush to our lunch stop so he could fix another tyre which had punctured and was on its way to be flat! Apparently it happens a lot and the driver was fantastic with dealing with it. Lunch was at a lake where there were a load of pink flamingos which was cool to see, although there are only so many pictures I can take of flamingos! The best stop of the day was probably the last, at Laguna Colorado which was an amazing array of colours of red and white (although the red doesn´t come out so well in the photos). This night we would stay at more of a hostel where everyone else would be staying too, so the driver rushed there to get a good room for us. The beds weren´t great and it was supposed to be freezing here but once we´d got into our rented sleeping bags and under all the blankets it was pretty warm.

The next morning (the 11th) was a very early start at 5.30am to go see the geysers and hot springs. Breakfast was at the very cold site of the hot springs where some people were brave enough to get undressed and get in. We´d taken out our swim stuff the night before with the plan that we´d get in, but when it came down to it there was no way I was taking off my 6 layers of clothing to do it. After breakfast we headed for Laguna Verde and Laguna Blanco and towards the border with Chile. The tour had been great but I was looking forward to getting back to civilization. The border crossing was easy enough. At the Bolivian border we said bye to our driver and the other people on our tour who would be spending the next 7 hours getting back to Uyuni. After getting our passports stamped we waited about 30 minutes for the bus that would take us to Chile. An hour and a half later we had completed the formalities at the Chile immigration office in San Pedro de Atacama and found a nice hostel to bed down in. The hostel had soap and toilet paper in the bathroom, which is definitely back to civilization compared to Bolivia!

So bye to Bolivia which has definitely been interesting and full of character and amazing sites.

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Photos

Typical local dress
I still don´t know how they keep the hat on their heads!

Cerro Rico
I´m sure it once was a nice foliage covered hill!