Bolivia

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On 20th Feb at 7.30 a.m. we got a bus from Puno in Peru to La Paz (3660m) in Bolivia. The views of the barren mountains, some snow capped, were really beautiful. We arrived in La Paz at 5.15 p.m., and got a taxi to a relatively nice hotel in the heart of the city. It was really chaotic, with loads of traffic and every inch of pavement occupied by stalls and people shouting about what they were trying to sell. We were still with George and Em (Rein and Char had decided to stop for a few days at Copacabana, a small town on Lake Titicaca on the Bolivian side) and we all had a good feeling about La Paz, which seemed really exciting and entertaining. Of course I wouldn’t want to live there it being like most cities polluted and busy but it was fascinating just to wander all the markets. That evening we went out for a surprisingly lovely meal, which was also really cheap. A decent steak set you back only a couple of pounds.
The next day whilst we did some more wandering of the street markets, Ruth stopped in a phone booth to call her parents. Whilst I was waiting a couple of local gentlemen came in and made a brief phone call, after which one of them approached me and mentioned I had some stuff on my back. He wiped it for me with some tissue and showed me how it was all yellow. I said thanks and wondered where it had come from, and stepping outside the building took my bag off to take my sweater off, when out of the corner of my eye I noticed a hand going for my bag. Realising they weren’t nice gentlemen after all but simply trying to distract me I grabbed my bag and shouted abuse at them, so they quickly walked away. It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book, which I have read about in the guides many times but never actually experienced. The stuff all over my sweater turned out to be mustard, which they had obviously sprayed on me themselves. Thank god I’d kept an eye on my bag but I was still stupid to have even taken it off, having at first believed them. It had been a close call but fortunately they hadn’t got away with it. Part of me wished I’d done more than just shout at them however, like maybe hit them hard (they weren’t very physically intimidating), insulted by the audacity and nerve of it, but hey, they were probably pretty poor and desperate and getting in fights isn’t exactly wise. The experience did serve one purpose however, from then on we were all a lot more aware keeping our eyes open for any pickpockets etc.
We also had to decide where and what we were going to do in Bolivia, Ruth and I both thinking we wanted to get to Southern Argentina pretty much as fast as possible, in need of some isolation and accessible mountain scenery. However carnival was approaching, a time when its not recommended to travel as everyone gets drunk, and not being in Rio as Ruth had dreamed we wanted to figure out where would be a good place. A town called Oruro apparently had the best party in Bolivia, and was on our route to the Chilean border, so we decided we would go there for the carnival. George and Em also decided to come down to Oruro, after which they, having more time, were going to come back up to La Paz and then head north for a jungle experience.
So after a few more days in La Paz, generally walking around markets and eating well in the evening, on 24th Feb, we headed to Oruro, about 6 hours by bus. We had booked our hotel in advance, as advised. When phoning many were fully booked and all had put up their prices by at least 4 times. The town was a complete dump, and the rooms windowless boxes only marginally bigger than the bed, and at $30 a complete rip off, but then this was apparently the place to be in Bolivia for the carnival. That evening we went for a walk and bought some tickets for seats on the main parade.
The next day we went to our seats, hiding our cameras under jackets or in plastic bags, knowing that part of the celebrations here involve water fighting and spraying each other with foam from aerosol cans. As gringos we were particularly susceptible to attacks, so by the time we had got half way to our seats we were already covered in foam and wet anywhere we weren’t protected by waterproofs. Unfortunately on the way Ruth lost her purse, which contained a bit of money, our bus tickets and our seat tickets for the show, but fortunately the guy recognised us so we got our seats no problem. It really was a squeeze though on the stands, and we didn’t dare get our cameras out for all the water and foam flying around. That said the parade and costumes that we watched for a couple of hours were really good, and the couple of beers were starting to go to our heads as we had had no breakfast or lunch. We decided to go back to the room, drop the cameras off, and buy some water pistols and foam sprayers so at least we could retaliate.
That afternoon we didn’t even make it back to our seats, but just wandered the streets taking part in water and foam fights with locals. It was great fun at first, and satisfying working as a team, drenching anyone who had the nerve to challenge us, but in the end and in hindsight it all be came too much, so that you couldn’t actually enjoy the carnival, or watch the show. It was also a pick pockets dream. I had caught one guy going for my pocket, and Ruth had caught an elderly lady trying to undo her pocket whilst stuck in a crowd. We retreated to our caves in the hotel just to have a break and be able to relax in peace, where Ruth also noticed one of her pockets had been slashed, and some ear-rings she had bought been stolen. They weren’t worth much but it was starting to get a little ridiculous.
Later that evening we went out for dinner, and couldn’t even make it to the restaurant without being attacked several times by the usual water and foam. By now lots of the locals were really drunk, and walking down the street one guy even punched Ruth in the head. When I realised what had happened I couldn’t believe it and turned round to the group of youths, one of which was being held back by his friends as he was still trying to attack us. They were saying ‘tranquillo’ and apologising for their completely wasted mate, so I just called him an idiot and that was that. Fortunately he had hit Ruth on the ear and not the mouth or nose so she soon recovered but was a little shocked for a while. Later on in Bolivia we met a North American chap in his twenties who had also been attacked whilst with a girl by some youths during carnival, but he had a split nose and she had received a nasty black eye. It seems there isn’t much stigma in hitting a girl here. In England we think there are too many larger louts but they are just as bad here. One has to start wondering about the amount of violence that is fuelled by alcohol the world over. It’s not even like it’s a new thing as the Incas loved a good brew as well. In fact there is another traditional festival here which foreigners are advised not to attend, during which the inhabitants of different villages get really drunk and then start fronting each other very aggressively, usually leading to violence and even deaths. Humans in general, and especially really drunk humans were really starting to get to Ruth and I, and we were beginning to long more and more for some remote mountain in Patagonia, without louts, without smog and pollution and opportune thieves seemingly lurching on every corner, somewhere where you could hopefully just appreciate the beauty of nature. It’s a shame because in the end the drunken revelry and even the water fighting ruined any chance of trying to appreciate the fantastic costumes that some had spent so much time making.
The next morning, 26th Feb, we were all in agreement that we wanted to leave the dive known as Oruro, even though we had paid for another night in the hotel in advance. We managed to change our bus tickets (even though we had lost them!), and get on a bus that lunch time, George and Em going back to La Paz, Ruth and I going on to Potosi, further south. After almost a month travelling together it was funny to say good-bye. It’s pretty rare for us to meet people and spend so much time with them without getting on each others nerves! Hopefully we’ll all meet up again sometime, perhaps in Santiago, and if not back in England. The journey to Potosi was really spectacular, the rocks and desert mountains being really attractive geological formations. Sometimes I think I enjoy the bus journeys more than the towns, just sitting back and watching the scenery go by. Arriving in Potosi we decided to stay in a nice hotel, with central heating and cable television, somewhere we could hide from the ongoing water and foam fighting that was still occurring all over the country. It was great to have a private shower and comfortable bed once again!
In Potosi there is a famous silver mine which can be visited, somewhere which has claimed lots of lives due to the harsh working conditions over the last few hundred years. Unfortunately due to the carnival it was closed, along with most of the restaurants and practically all of the shops. Time was also ticking by, every day spent in Bolivia one less in Patagonia, so after a couple of days rest, hiding in our room from the water, foam and drunken locals, we headed further south to Uyuni, somewhere firmly on the tourist route thanks to its famous salt flats.
Uyuni itself was another dive, with fields of litter on the outskirts, and the town itself really dusty and run down. In the evening though it had a pleasant market which we strolled through. We arranged a day tour of the salt flats, rather than the more popular three day tour which also goes to some lakes as well, which we did on the 2nd March. We joined a couple of Dutch blokes for the tour in a jeep, who were really interesting and with whom we managed to discuss most of the problems of the known world. The salt flats were really surreal, and it was fun having a picnic lunch in the middle of such a vast expanse.
We had originally been planning to cross the border on the east side of Bolivia into Chile, and then bus it straight down to Santiago, but changed our minds at Uyuni and decided to travel to Villazon, on the border with Argentina, and then go straight to Buenos Aires, looking forward to a bit of sophistication and a nice Argentinean steak. On the morning of March 3rd we had to get up at 4.30 a.m. to get a jeep to a small place called Atocha, where we had to wait for a while and then get another jeep to Tupiza, on route to Villazon. Ruth and I had been warned that we had to change jeep, and that we would probably have a delay of a couple of hours, but some of the other gringos thought the one jeep went directly, and they totally lost the plot when informed of the two hour wait. It’s always quite amusing if a little embarrassing watching some westerner freak out at local standards, but also something that’s easy to relate to, getting tired and stressed by the hassles of travelling in a developing country. It seemed a bit overboard however, I mean a two hour delay in Bolivia is hardly extreme, (in the wet season buses can apparently be delayed by almost a week). Soon however Ruth’s and my own will were going to be tested once again.
The journey in the jeep was really incredible, a long and unpaved dirt track, through magnificent scenery with incredible rock formations, like something out of the wild west. It was easy to imagine Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid travelling down here on their horses as they did about a hundred years ago. Even the cramped conditions in the jeep (they stuffed in as many as they could) couldn’t deter us from appreciating the scenery.
The jeep journey ended at Tupiza, where we had to get a bus to Villazon. It was here that we realised one of our bags had gone missing. In Atocha we had given it to the jeep driver who had put it on the roof along with all the other luggage, but in Tupiza it wasn’t there. Fortunately it wasn’t one of our main bags, but was a local style bag that Ruth had used to carry her souvenirs from our travels so far. It was nowhere to be seen and the driver claimed ignorance. Soon the police were involved and we had to go to the station, but there was nothing they could do. Perhaps somebody took it off the roof whilst the driver was distracted, perhaps the driver himself took it. Though Ruth was pretty upset at the loss of most of her souvenirs, it wasn’t worth much in value, and at least she had put the jewellery she had bought in her main bag. I also still had the items I had bought, so we still have some items to remind us of Ecuador and the other countries. That said I was pretty gutted as well, especially about the nice alpaca cushion covers which we had bought and were in her bag.
After a couple of hours in Tupiza we managed to get on a bus to Villazon, and crossed the border into Argentina around 6.00 p.m. on 3rd March. Bolivia had been a fascinating country, and the scenery especially remote and picturesque, but although the majority of people had been really kind and friendly, the string of attempted robberies, the small incident of drunken aggression, and the final theft of one of our bags, had definitely put a bit of a negative on the final impression. Still it was a shame that our visit there was so brief, and that we missed out on a large amount of what the country had to offer, (much of which will be available in other countries to come, like trekking, jungle experiences, mountain biking etc) but we have only a finite time until we fly out of Santiago, and we are looking forward to more travels in Argentina.

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Photos

Foetuses and other goods
Put in the foundations of a house they bring good luck, ward of evil etc.