Advertisement
Published: June 24th 2007
Today was our first real taste of Bolivian local transport. The bus picked us up from the hotel earlier than planned (which is unusual in South America), & our backpacks were loaded onto the rooftop where hopefully they will stay for the six hour journey ahead to Potosi. We next picked up more people from the town and loaded on their luggage. In Bolivia this can consist of anything and today included a drainage pipe. The number of seats does not restrict the number of passengers, so a few of the locals sat in the aisle and on our armrests for part of the journey. The bus was decorated with various religious and Christmas items.
We left the town, and noticed that the surrounding outskirts were so littered with rubbish, the dry wild vegetation could only just be seen, amongst the crumbling stone buildings. As we looked out the dusty windows we watched as the landscape passed our eyes, the mountain backdrop, and looked in excitement of anything of interest. We spotted the odd donkey, a herd of vicunas or alpacas, and families washing clothes in the streams.
The journey was long with no toilet onboard, luckily the driver
stopped for a few moments so that passengers could relieve themselves behind the crumbling rocks. Then he became a little impatient and started beeping his horn and revving the engine! In order to get around single lane corners the driver would beep to warn any oncoming vehicles and continue at his speedy pace as the bus wound up the mountains, with interesting music playing in the background (panpipes the norm here). We stopped for short break at a half-built village with a few piglets roaming the dusty tracks.
As we arrived at the bustling town of Potosi, one of the locals attempted to pickpocket one of the group, fortunately nothing was obtained! Then we took our differing qualities of taxis (some in better condition than others), to Hotel Jerusalem in the centre of town. We soon learnt that there were festivities taking place in the town, market/food stalls and old-fashioned tin fair rides.
The town had a lovely colonial charm, with some beautiful buildings, ornate cathedrals and narrow roads overlooking the terracotta houses on the hill. As it was Sunday most things were closed, so we made our way to the pretty square. Then we wandered through the
bustling streets and saw numerous cakes being sold in the streets for the festivities. In the evening we all went out to a modern gringo-style restaurant for dinner, unfortunately little choice for veggies so opted for pasta dishes. Two Argentinean men serenaded us as we ate which included an Elvis Presley song! Then back to our hotel for the night to enjoy the hot showers and television, what a privilege not used to such comforts anymore!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.169s; Tpl: 0.009s; cc: 16; qc: 77; dbt: 0.1133s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Impressive Colonial Architecture
