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Published: March 3rd 2013
Beach Piggies - Isla del Sol
Scavenging after hippies broke camp. After an uneventful bus ride along the banks of Lake Titicaca, and after paying $135 each to cross Bolivia's borders we arrived in the "resort" town of Copacabana. After locating our hostel we quickly turned on the television to watch The Rose Bowl. We spent that evening not only annoyed by the Badgers performance, but also with each other's incessant renditions of Barry Manilow's catchy lyrics.
Our next day was spent touring Isla del Sol, the legendary Inca creation site and the birthplace of the sun in Inca mythology, namely the mystical appearance of Manco Capac and his sister-wife Mama Ocllo. Just a couple of personal opinions about Isla del Sol. #1: yo, Bolivia, invest in some more powerful motors for the boats that go out to IdS so every tourist isn't beyond annoyed they spent 5 painfully slow hours on a boat getting to/back from an island they can see the shores of from the city. #2: if this is where "it" all began maybe you should put up better signage so we know where the
sites are and what it is we're here to see so we're not wandering around not knowing what we're looking for? Maybe we hit the Inca wall having come from Peru and having a certain expectation for historical sites; however, Isla del Sol, cool place, don't go, just read about it. Actually, on second thought, go to Isla del Sol for the Argentinian hippies and beach piglets, that was a much better show.
The next day and a half we spent enjoying the abundant (and very strong) sunshine by walking through the local markets, visiting the Cathedral, and hiking up Cerro Calvario which climbs past the 14 stations of the cross and offers an excellent view of Copacabana.
At the market we ran into our first dried llama fetuses or "sullus". Dried llama fetuses are buried under the earth and an estimated 99 percent of all families in Bolivia have one under the foundation of their home for good luck. This belief is so strong that construction workers will refuse to work in a building if there has not been a “cha'lla,” or blessing, with a sullus buried underground at the work site.
On our way to
the Cathedral we were able to watch some vehicles be blessed in the Bendiciones de Movilidades ceremony. The family who owns the vehicle adorns it with streamers, flower petal confetti, stacks of play money and assorted miniatures (cars, houses), blares music on the car stereo, and after the priest blesses the car they spray champagne all over their vehicle, and drink the rest! All done in an effort to keep them safe while driving for the next year. I could get into that.
Inside the Cathedral we saw the famous Virgen de Candelaria. She has always remained in the Cathedral because as legend has it if she is removed this would cause a devastating storm and flood of Lake Titicaca. A finely-dressed replica is taken out on festival processions. However, the coolest thing we saw at the Cathedral was in a side sanctuary where people come to light candles and with the softened wax create words or pictures as a prayer offering. The dark room with its dark walls, adorned with the simple white wax words and pictures illuminated only by the light of hundreds of candles really captivated our interest for quite awhile. Outside of the Cathedral we
Waxy Wishes
Copacabana Cathedral were treated to the filming of an Andean pan flute music video before hopping on our bus to La Paz. FYI if you ever get to watch dudes play the air Andean pan flute it's awesome.
La Paz We had to pass through the massive suburb of El Alto before beginning the descent into La Paz which sits at 11,437ft. Unfortunately due to clouds and rain we weren't able to take advantage of what is said to be one of South America's most beautiful city views, the sprawling valley of La Paz overlooked by Mount Illamani (20,006 ft). Upon arriving in La Paz we walked the city to get our bearings, checking out the main plaza, walking park and main boulevard. We were excited to see in the plaza several of the shoe shine boys wearing ski masks that we read about in our tour book. That evening we ate some decent Thai food, and we also met a very unique guy from New Orleans that came to our table and asked if the protocol for dealing with altitude sickness was Codeine and beer. I gave him some Diamox.
The next day we hopped on our tour
to Chacaltaya which was once the world's highest ski area (16,625 - 15,312ft) prior to the glacier melting completely in 1990. We chose to go on this tour so we could take in the amazing views of the Cordilleras. Mother Nature had different plans. About a third of the way up it began to rain, then snow. We began chugging up the glacial scree road with massive drop offs in a rickety bus (with what I'd swear was a three-foot lift kit), slipping around corners and having to back down others to make tight switchback turns. The whole way up people were gasping in fear, Sky was saying, "yeah, if we roll down that one we won't survive", and I was hunkered down as low in my seat as possible, death grip on the armrests and tears in my eyes! Once we reached the top there wasn't a view to be had due to the wind driven snow. Not all was lost as we did enjoy watching the Brazilians on our tour who have never seen snow before throw snowballs at each other.
One of the highlights of La Paz came later that evening. Fighting Cholitas wrestling! Basically women
lucha libres with long braids, bowler hats and skirts. For only $B75 ($10 US) we were picked up at our hotel, driven to El Alto, given ringside VIP seating, provided a snack (popcorn & soda), and souvenirs (cholita figurine and postcards)! Those weren't the only gifts bestowed upon us that night. Traditional male lucha libre matches with participants setting wood crates on fire, flipping off and cursing at the audience, taking popcorn and sodas from the audience, breaking of fluorescent tubes over competitors heads, the throwing of chicken bones into the ring by the local audience members, and finally what might be the holy grail of cholita wrestling: the midget cholita. Check #57 off the bucket list.
The other highlight of La Paz came the next day when we went mountain biking down "The World's Most Dangerous Road." I know all of you have seen the videos on TV of buses plunging, or sliding off the narrow road. Well, apparently after thousands of deaths (average 26 vehicles per year) the Bolivian government decided to open a replacement road in 2007, effectively closing the WMDR to all but cyclists, support vehicles, and random tourist vehicles.
The stats for mountain
biking the WMDR are as follows: a ten-foot wide, 39.7 mile long road with an 11,250ft vertical descent with 1800ft drop offs and no safety barriers. The day started by being picked up in the morning and driven to the starting point, La Cumbre, 14,687ft. Here we were given the safety briefing, and outfitted with our safety gear. Jumpsuit, helmet, knee and elbow pads, and gloves. I chose the fully articulated mountain bike, this being the first time I've mountain biked, I needed all of the help I could get!
After posing for the customary pre-ride/death photos we were on our way. The first part involved riding down a stretch of the newer paved replacement road to the checkpoint. This gave people an opportunity to become acquainted with their bikes and abilities. Apart from pouring rain, fog, limited visibility and traffic it was a lot of fun. We then hopped into the vans, were driven the 5 miles uphill to the start of the WMDR. We were so happy that the weather improved so we'd be able to enjoy the truly spectacular scenery, and not slip/ride off a cliff. It was a great ride with Sky typically leading the
Lake Titicaca
Isla del Sol in Background pack and me taking it a little bit slower, no injuries/near misses for either of us and limited carnage for other riders. The ride ended with a much needed shower and lunch before taking another painfully slow ride all the way back to La Paz.
Feeling pretty pumped up from our awesome day and watching the Packers play, we found some energy to actually go out and sample the La Paz nightlife. We found a bar known to be popular with travelers, wound up running into people from our ride, and staying out until 4am. Let's just say we didn't end up taking the bus to Cochabamba that morning, instead spent the day recovering, eating pizza and watching dubbed movies on TV. Ahhh, the days of yesteryear.
Santa Cruz & Samaipata After spending many weeks at high altitude, wearing hikers and our warm jackets we were in need of some warmer weather so we decided to head to Southeast Bolivia. After recovering from our night out we bused it from La Paz to Cochabamba (11 hours), then from Cochabamba to Santa Cruz (12 hours). I don't think either of us really gave any thought to how warm
JC's Got Us Covered
Chacaltaya Bus Ride it might actually be in SE Bolivia. Stepping off of the bus was like stepping into a hotdog bun steamer. We then checked into an equally hot hostel with only a fan that was going to turn its last turn at any moment. We knew we wanted to stay put for a couple of days so I could watch the Broncos/Ravens game (no comment) and Sky the Packers/Niners game (no comment) somewhere. Already sweating buckets at 7am I promptly freaked out and stated that if we're staying in the sweat lodge of Santa Cruz to watch football we're doing it in a hotel that has AC and a pool!
Happy as clams in our new hotel we escaped the heat by swimming, eating ice cream, and travel researching from the confines of our chilly hotel room. We had also come to Santa Cruz to possibly go on the Ché Guevara Route Tour, we'd seen it advertised all over Bolivia, and of course his image has been plastered on every bit of schwag during our travels. I knew absolutely nothing about the man, but after a little research we figured there'd be better ways to spend our time and money.
Realizing Santa Cruz was a bust we decided to head to Southwest Bolivia. Choosing to opt out of the 15 - 25 hour (depending on road conditions) bus ride to Sucre we booked a 30-minute flight instead, the only problem being it didn't leave for 3 days! That's how we ended up in Samaipata.
Samaipata was such a welcome relief from the heat of Santa Cruz. It's a beautiful, refreshing little village at 5100ft in the Cordillera Oriental. There really isn't a whole lot to do in Samaipata, but we did visit El Fuerte - pre-Columbian ritualistic site and "World's Largest Carved Stone" - and take part in amazing hiking and river wading through the Cordilleras.
Sucre & Potosí We flew (how refreshing) from Santa Cruz to Sucre. Sucre is a nice little town, home to numerous universities, and it is Bolivia's judicial capital. Sucre was just a one night stopover on our way to Potosí. It was a lovely town with great architecture, churches, and a badass German restaurant. Strangely enough we ran into the guy from New Orleans that we met in La Paz, it looked like he was still partaking in the Codeine and
beer regimen.
Potosí was the real reason we came to this region of Bolivia. We had been hearing about the silver mine in Potosí for weeks and couldn't wait to check it off of our list. Potosí sits at an altitude of 12,719ft so is apparently the world's highest city (?). There is a lot of fascinating history associated with Potosí and the mountain Cerro Rico at whose base it sits. The city was founded in 1545 after ore deposits were found in Cerro Rico. The veins proved to be the world's most lucrative, so much so that Potosí grew into the largest and wealthiest city in Latin America. The Potosí mines underwrote the Spanish economy for over two hundred years and is still being very actively mined today (Spain could sure use that underwriting these days!).
The biggest and only tourist attraction in Potosí is Cerro Rico and a tour of a working cooperative mine. We booked our tour with Big Deal Tours, the only tour company owned and operated by ex-miners. They were a group of pretty crazy guys, led by the craziest one of them all, Pedro. The first stop on the tour was to
the miner's market to purchase gifts for the miners. As we would be touring their active workplace, stopping them to ask questions and interfering with the flow of the mine the gifts are meant to offset our being a pain in their ass. Suggested gifts included bags of coca leaves, 2L bottles of soda, Ceibo - which is 96% alcohol, and dynamite with ammonium nitrate booster pellets. The perfect Christmas list! We purchased coca leaves and booze.
After the market we were taken to be outfitted in coveralls, miners hat and light, bandana to prevent us from inhaling too much dust (arsenic?), and mud boots. Dressed in the proper outfit we went to check out a mineral refinery. I don't know what I had in mind, but it looked pretty rustic with different chemicals being picked up via paper cups attached to a mini waterwheel in the exact concentration to effectively leech out the silver into solution. I guess whatever works. According to Pedro, refining is where the real money is to be made. The majority of refineries throughout Bolivia are owned by foreign companies that are making a killing on the massive amounts and diversity of mineral deposits
within the borders of this country.
Then it was time for the tour of the working cooperative mine. While at the entrance to the mine two thoughts went through my head: what the hell am I doing, and how am I going to fit in there?!? Thankfully I didn't have too much time to dwell on these questions, sensing Pedro's excitement about showing us the mine we switched on our miner's lamps and off into the bowels of Cerro Rico we went. Both Sky and I are so happy we had mining helmets because if we didn't we both would have scalped ourselves within the first 50ft.
We spent about 45 minutes bent over at the waist walking down the mine shaft deeper into the mountain. At times we'd have to backtrack in a hurry and tuck ourselves tight up against the wall as a cart or wheelbarrow was being pushed down the rails and had quite a bit of momentum behind it. For a good portion of our time in the mine the air was so hot and thick with dust it was difficult to breathe. Along the way we'd stop and ask questions of the miners
and pass along our gifts as thanks for their time. Thankfully at one point the mine shaft opened up and we were able to stand and breathe normally. We even saw delicate stalactites of brightly colored minerals as we passed through different areas of the mine.
We climbed up a series of three ladders that took us to where the statue of Tío was "erected". Tío is the guardian of the mine, and these miners take Tío very seriously, he is regarded by the miners as the epitome of machismo as mining is considered the most machismo profession in this region. Tío is regularly given Ceibo to drink, coca leaves to chew, and cigarettes to smoke in exchange for his protection and prosperity in and out of the mine. Pedro wouldn't let us leave Tío until our entire group finished a bottle of Ceibo by passing it around. It didn't help that the stuff tasted and burned like lighter fluid so no one could take more than a baby sip. I tried to get Sky to take one for the team and down a few big gulps to move things along. No dice. He's grown wise on this journey.
I'm pretty sure everyone breathed a sigh of relief once we exited the mine. I'm pretty sure I won't need to do a mine tour ever again. Little did we know the highlight of the mine tour was yet to come. One of the sticks of dynamite somehow didn't get gifted to a miner! Imagine that. So we all gathered around Pedro as he demonstrated how to mash up the stick of dynamite, then fold the small pellets of ammonium nitrate into the it, wrap it all up in a plastic bag like a ball of mozzarella, stick the fuse in it, and light it. For about 30 seconds Pedro and his cohort posed for pictures with the fuse burning, his buddy then ran off down the hill with the dynamite, found a safe spot to place it, them for some reason started doing one-armed pushups over the burning ball. Man I love developing countries! For such a small stick of dynamite it packed quite a punch, shaking the ground and echoing off the mountainside. And with that our time in Potosí was over.
Uyuni, the Salar de Uyuni and Reserva Nacional de Fauna Andina We then
headed further Southwest to Uyuni, the jumping point for the mystical salt flats of Bolivia, another one of our "can't wait to go to" places in South America. The Salar de Uyuni is the world's largest salt flat covering over 7500 square miles. Google it, it's a cool place. The most popular way to see the Salar and the Reserva is to take a multi-day jeep tour. After arriving in Uyuni on a Saturday in the pouring rain we found our way to Red Planet Tours and booked our 3-day 2-night trip to start that Monday. The owner cautioned us that the weather had been a little iffy (ie. raining for ten days), and that the Salar was pretty much flooded as well as the roads leading to the Reserva were washed out and impassable. But she told us to come back the morning of our tour and if it doesn't rain anymore everything should be just fine. Uhhh...ok.
Thankfully it did not rain at all on Sunday. Monday morning we arrived at the agency and met the other people that would be on our tour. We also were able to hear about the conditions of the road to
Death Road Crew
Start of Death Road the Reserva from a group that had left day before, pretty much that there was no longer a road. But with blazing blue skies above us we were assured all would be ok and the tour shall commence.
There were 6 in our jeep and 6 in the other (Aussies and Kiwis). With us we had our driver, two law students from Brazil, a girl from the UK and the tour guide, Crazy Gonzalo. So off we went. Our first stop was the locomotive graveyard, which was just that, a locomotive graveyard. Pretty cool to see the old, rusty machines slowly with time turning into dust. Then it was off to Colchani, a salt-extracting town on the eastern edge of the Salar. Here we climbed on some big piles of salt and watched a dude bag salt. Meh.
We then drove a little further to our lunch spot. A super cool hotel made entirely out of salt blocks and which also contained some pretty cool salt sculptures. After the group finished lunch Gonzalo told us to set out on foot across the mud flat to the start of the Salar and that they'd come pick us up in
a little while. Huh? So off we go. Let me remind you it has been raining for ten days with a day and a half of sun so the mud flat had a nice buttery hard crust, but a gooey caramel center. As I'm the first one in the group to set out within 10 steps I crash through the crust and end up ankle deep in mud, when I remove my feet my flip flops have been sucked off my feet. Just as I'm pulling my now mud platformed flip flops out muck you know who walks over (I'm convinced his flip flops are mini hovercrafts) without a speck of dirt on him to see what all of the commotion was about. After listening to me rant for awhile we found the nearest puddle of water for me to clean up. Freakin' Gonzalo.
Finally we reached the Salar! The reason we had been waiting so long to get to the Salar is for the amazing pictures you can take here. During dry season you can take cool perspective shots, and in wet season cool reflection shots. Unfortunately, due to the extremely severe rain and subsequent flooding the Salar
Cruisin'
"New" Death Road had a thin layer of foam all over it making it difficult to get the shots we were hoping for. We gave it our best effort though.
After the Salar it was back to Uyuni to see if the road to the Reserva had opened up and if we'd be able to continue the tour. Thankfully the report was the flooding had subsided enough to make it possible for cars to pass. So off we went. All was cool, we were cruising down the road, then we heard the sound (why does it sound like a waterfall?), then we saw the river (wait there should be a road there), then we saw the lake (wait there should be a road there). Why are we still driving if there's no road? Why are we still driving if we can see an overturned semi in the middle of the lake/road? Hmmm, can I get out of this back window should the need arise? The amount of water passing over the road and the sound that it made as it did was deafening even thought it was only a few inches deep, but it sure did make for a harrowing and time
consuming crossing.
Over the next two days we spent many hours in the jeep crisscrossing across the Reserva to see all of the different things in the Reserva: several lagunas, cool rock formations, flamingoes, hot springs, etc.. The final day Sky and I had to spend 7-hours backtracking across the Reserva back to Uyuni because he didn't have enough pages in his passport for us to jump in to Chile.
Villazon, yeesh. We hopped on our 8:30pm bus to go to Villazon which borders Argentina. Something Sky ate didn't agree with him so he had a nightmarish 11 hours. I narced myself with a sleep aid and was pretty much dead to the world the whole ride. We arrived in Villazon along with a Kiwi couple that was on our Salar tour. We hoofed it down from the town center to the border and immediately saw a pretty long queue of people already lined up across the bridge. Us girls took the baggage and posted up in line while the guys went out to find food and exchange money.
The line couldn't have moved any slower. We were in line for about an hour and a
half, and had moved about 10 feet when an Argentinian immigration officer made his way through the line checking passports in an effort to speed things along as the line had already doubled back on itself. When he got to Sky and me he asked us if we had the paper showing we had both paid the $160 US "reciprocity fee". Uhhh....what reciprocity fee? You know, the reciprocity fee that went into effect on January 1st. Uhhh....no, we don't have the paper, but no problem we have US dollars and we can pay at the window. Oh, sorry gringo, no pass go, that can only be paid online, and you must print out a copy for your passport. There's an (by an, he means one) internet cafe in town that you can get this taken care of, now step out of line please. Bye Kiwi friends, enjoy Argentina.
A little side note about the internet in Bolivia, it doesn't exist. Actually, that's not true, it does, it's just one piece of optic fiber stretched across the 681,119 square miles of Bolivia which is then plugged into a dial-up modem that's only turned on from 10am to 6pm. That's internet
Death Curve
World's Most Dangerous Road in Bolivia.
So Sky and I hiked back up into the main part of town, found a hotel, ditched our packs, went to the ATM to get Bolivanos since now all we had were Argentinian pesos, and hunted for the internet cafe. We found the cafe, found the website to pay the fee, registered but couldn't pay because the payment page couldn't load because the connection was too slow! So we slogged back to our hotel, called my dad, gave him all necessary information to log in/pay/create user profiles/launch missiles/everything and anything and had him send us the PIN code so we could then print our golden tickets. OK, no problem. We went back to the internet cafe. Now the registration website won't recognize the PIN codes so we can't print the tickets. Slogged back to the hotel, called my dad, please print/scan/send the tickets to our email. OK, no problem. Back to the internet cafe, SUCCESS, third time's a charm! Thankfully the rest of our last full day in Bolivia proved to be uneventful, we relaxed, added what I like to call Heaven in a Pocket -the Argentinean empanada- to our diets and made a plan for our
run for the border the next morning.
Sorry for this very long winded blog entry, but there really was a lot to see and tell about in South America's fifth largest country. It's an amazing place with a lot of potential. I actually wrote this during a very long bus ride to Ushuaia, Argentina which you'll hear all about in Sky's next blog post! Tons of pictures with this post!
Love Becky & Sky
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