Bolivia

Bolivia:

La Paz: This was the first city we visited in Bolivia which we reached via a border crossing. I had to stay behind a little longer due to my South African passport but eventually a baffled looking official stamped by passport causing me to sigh with relief! Please note that South Africans need a visa for Bolivia. Our first view of La Paz was from a viewing point on the roadside at the top of a hill. It is a beautiful city which is sprawled out between the mountains at an altitude of 3660m! The city is a mixture of rich and poor and the buildings range from modern skyscrapers to mud buildings. All the streets are lined with the usual vendors selling fruit, vegetables, pastas, rice, pulses, herbs, llama clothing, empanadas (pastries stuffed with either meat, cheese or a sweet filling), fried chicken, boiled offal, deep fried intestines as well as some dishes which I can only guess at! They also sell a lot of meat which is displayed unrefridgerated on the sidewalks and also include all the bits of offal ranging from entrails, lungs, and liver to trotters, hoofs and snouts.

La Paz is also known for the Witches Market and the Black Market where they sell electronics at very reasonable prices. Adrian and I visited the Black Market as I wanted to buy a notebook and external hard drive and Adrian wanted to replace his Sony camera which got damaged by sand when we visited the desert in Haucachina. One thing that I’ve found interesting is that shops selling the same thing all seemed to be clustered together, so all the electronics shops were all bunched together on one street. We were there too early and after a long search we found a coffee kiosk/shack (together with probably another 50 others) in a local market. The kiosk was situated right next to the meat section and every now and then we would get a waft of offal. The coffee was strong, black and laced with about 4 spoons of sugar! On a sugar high we were able to successfully purchase our goods after visiting many shops and comparing prices. One thing that amazed me though was the lack of bartering – at most markets that is the norm but it seems that most prices in the Black Market were fixed.

The Witches Market was also an interesting place to visit. They sold all sorts of interesting things but the most bizarre is probably the dried llama, alpaca and pig foetuses! These are placed underneath a newly built house and will apparently give you good luck! There were also a few shops selling musical instruments and I managed to buy a classical guitar with case and two plectrums for 270 Bolivianos (after some haggling of course).

The Ghost Ride: One of the must do things in La Paz is cycling the infamous “world’s most dangerous road”. This road is built high up around the edge of a mountain and many vehicles have fallen off the cliff edges in the past. In recent years they have built a new road which took care of this problem although this road still retains its reputation as the world’s most dangerous road. The Ghost Ride is an alternative and much more exciting ride as most of the ride is done on single track! We also started higher and got to race over loose shale hills while wearing gloves, helmets, trousers and jackets. On quite a few occasions we had the option to either cycle down a very steep and tricky bit - those who weren’t brave enough could cycle round an easier section. We had great fun cycling down some of these sections – sometimes locking the back break to slow down! Most of our group wiped out at least once, including me! 

Myself and Adrian raced after our guide, sometimes going very fast. We also got to do a few jumps and cycle down stairways. Even when it started raining we battled on with big grins on our muddy faces. We finished our trip that day in a haunted castle where we had a well needed shower and late lunch. It was a great day and well worth it - even though some of us had scrapes and bruises!

Potosi: Known as the highest city in the world according to the Lonely Planet. Other than visiting the mines there is not a lot happening. A small group of us went to visit the mines which proved to be very entertaining. First of all we had to get dressed in khaki colored overalls complete with hard hats, battery packs and headlamps. On our way to the mines we stopped at the mining market where we bought gifts for the miners. This included cookies, coca leaves, cigarettes, ammonium nitrate, detonators, fuses and sticks of dynamite! I couldn’t believe that you can buy dynamite over the counter and I bought some for myself (only 20 Bolivianos, about 3 dollars!) to blow something up at a later date!

The mines are wrought with danger and the death toll is very high. There are many young boys (sometimes as young as 12) working in the mines. The miners work ridiculously long hours and to cope with the work they constantly chew coca leaves. To activate the properties of the leaves they add an alkaline which is either carbonate of soda or quinoa ash which is formed into a hard block. The leaves are then chewed into a ball which they keep in their cheeks. This numbs them and therefore they can work very long hours. The average life expectancy of a miner is only 40 to 50 years old. The miners that we saw didn’t even have any dust mask on!

We saw a few devils down in the mines which the miners erected and give offerings to for good luck. The offerings include things like coca leaves, alcohol and cigarettes. For good luck the girls in our group had to touch the penis of the devil and make a wish! Afterwards we climbed up some narrow passages to reach the top and that is also where our guide showed us how to prepare the dynamite which she then blew up. The blast was massive and we all jumped when it went off causing many blurry photos! The mines were great definitely worth the visit and an eye opener, especially being able to buy dynamite over the counter for next to nothing! Other than visiting the mines, Potosi hasn’t got that much to offer – even the restaurants that we visited were very average.

Uyuni:  This was a very weird town with not a lot happening. The only things there are small market stalls and many pizza restaurants. The only thing to do is to visit the Salar  - the largest salt flats in the world covering an area of 12 000 sq km! We stayed in a hotel called Tonito which had their own pizza shop where we ate all the time. Their food was very good, especially their “death by chocolate” slices which were devoured very speedily by all the girls! Great was their disappointment when they ran out on the second night.

We went on a 2 day trip to visit the salt flats travelling in 4x4s. Our first stop was to see how the salt is harvested – the workers pile salt into mounds with shovels and they only get 10 Bolivianos for each pile so it is very hard work for very little money. The next stop was the “illegal salt hotel” which is completely built from hard blocks of salt. The only reason why this hotel is illegal is that they don’t want a village to spring up thus contaminating the salt flats. Once that hotel breaks down it would not be rebuild.

Our next stop was Fish Island where we hiked between the giant cacti and also stopped for a picnic lunch. On the way there our guide showed us a bus that crashed into island. It is a common problem for people to fall asleep or lose their way because of the long straight distances with very few landmarks! After lunch we had time to do our silly photo shoots on the salt flats themselves. Because of the vast area of the salt flats it is difficult to perceive distance and therefore you can create some brilliant photos with some objects up close and others further away. After about 2 hours of messing around with various props we drove to a very small deserted village where we stayed for the night.

The next morning we went to see the Chupati skeletons – they were very short hunter/gatherers who lived in caves and only came out at night because of the tremendous heat during the day. Carbon dating estimated that they lived about 1000BC! Apparently they all died because of starvation when the volcano erupted. Next we hiked up the volcano which was brilliant red and yellow in colour due to iron oxide and sulphur. Given the altitude, the hike was tough and some struggled to reach the top. After lunch in a little village at the base of the volcano we went to see the flamingos. There are 3 different types of flamingos (Argentinian, Chilean and Bolivian) – the Bolivian type being especially pink. We were given some more time to take some silly pictures having learned from our mistakes of the previous day and then we travelled back to Uyuni via a train cemetery which was a questionable stop as it was not very exciting at all.

Tupiza: From Uyuni we travelled to Tupiza via Potosi where we spent the night. That day it was Aoife’s birthday and because she is Irish most of us wore green. The roads were bad and we travelled mostly via dirt roads – playing cards were especially difficult with a shaking bus. The vegetation became more lush as we travelled out of the desert towards Argentina which was a nice change to the scenery. We had lunch in a dried river bed and some of our group had a shot of tequila to celebrate Aoife’s birthday. I had been like an impatient little boy waiting to blow up the dynamite I bought in Potosi and given the border crossing the next day I needed to use it!

Our lunch spot was a perfect place as there were no stray animals or other humans around. I picked a spot up on a hill away from the truck.  Adrian, my sidekick, helped with setting up the explosive by molding the dynamite into a ball for me while I connected the fuse to the detonator and crimped it into place. I had to twist the ends of the fuse between my fingers to fluff up the powder inside first. Next I stuck the detonator into the ball of dynamite and placed the ball on top of the ammonium nitrate. To secure it all I tied a knot around everything with the fuse line and hey presto! We were very quick to leg it down the hill in our flip flops greatly encouraged by the “psssssst” sound coming from the fuse! An eager entourage of fellow camera armed travelers waited for the big bang. The fuse took about 3 minutes to detonate the dynamite and the explosion was spectacular causing most of our group to jump! Please note that I DO NOT promote the use of dynamite – it is very dangerous and could prove fatal to not just yourself but others around you!

After our explosive lunch break we travelled onwards to Tupiza. We divided into groups to participate in a quiz that Mike had lovingly put together to entertain us all. I was in group No. 2 which was with Aoife the birthday girl, so we called ourselves the Shamrocks. It was only apt that we won that day being Aoefa’s birthday and we were all in good spirits when we reached Tupiza. That night we highjacked the roof terrace at our hostal and decorated it with balloons. There was also a cooler box filled with ice, beer and various bottles of strong liquor. Aoife made us each a little green shamrock to wear and Lynne and Steph had bought us all a little party hat. A set of iPod speakers supplied the music which caused most of our alcohol fuelled group to dance. We ordered takeaway (pizza and pasta) which we had on the roof. I left after that as I’ve had an irritating cold but the rest of the group partied on till late! I was kept awake by endless “woos” and drunken singing for quite some time – at least they had fun and Aoife had a brilliant birthday.

Complete photo album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=301703&id=749927742&l=9c84c6d163