I guess you might be wondering if I survived the desert expedition or not… I did. It was a phenomenal trip. But I’m going to start the day before. With the geysers.
It was the first time I have ever seen geysers ever and I loved them! I had to get up at about 3:45 the morning before because you’re supposed to see them at sunrise and they’re not exactly close. At 4, the little minibus came and picked me up at the hostel and from there it was two and a half hours up a ridiculously rough road way high up into the mountains. Just as we began to see the first light, we pulled up to the gate of the park and got out for the bathroom and to pay for tickets. It was cold. I absolutely didn’t expect it. I mean, I knew high up, it would be chilly, but here was FREEZING. They told us it was -15 — that’s 5 degrees! I absolutely did NOT bring the right clothes for 5 degree weather. After we finally got down to the geysers, we waited around sipping hot mate de coca as it got lighter and lighter. Our driver told us a little about the geology and the history of the area (of the Americans who came to exploit the geothermal field for electric power, but then completely failed… typical!). Before long, the suncame over the mountains and the geysers really started jetting (something to do with heat and pressure…). Seeing the rays of sunand shadows shined through the steam was absolutely beautiful! A little later, we ate breakfast and piled back into the van to head to another geyser field with a hot spring. I wasn’t crazy enough to strip down and swim. We’re still talking arctic temps… After, we headed back down stopping in one little town for llama kebabs and finally arrived back in San Pedro a little after noon.
One again, I was up early the next morning for the crossing into Bolivia. This time I had to haul all my junk into town to meet the bus. Once we were all there, they took us by the Chilean immigrations office in town (yes, this border crossing is so far out that they don’t even bother to do the Chilean formalities there). After everyone was “out” of Chile, we headed up into the mountains again and after a bit on a dirt road, we came over a crest and saw a little sign that said “Bolivia” and a little hut. That was Bolivian immigrations. As we pulled up, a couple old Toyota Land Cruisers came speeding in from the Bolivia side. Our rides for the next few days! After the bus pulled to a stop, they funneled us all of and into the hut to complete the Bolivian immigration formalities. Crossing was a bit different than the last time I came to Bolivia. Before, they just stamped you and you were good to go. Well… Evo doesn’t like people from the US so much. They confiscated my passport because I didn’t have a visa. You’re supposed to be able cross wherever just picking up the visa application and paying then and there or somewhere at an official immigrations office. After a good amount of negotiation, they finally agreed to give my passport to my driver ONLY if he would take me to the immigrations office a few days later in Uyuni. Of course, he wanted nothing of the extra responsibility, so he gave it right back to me as soon as we got in the car.
After that was all done, they piled our backpacks and everything onto the top of the trucks with stoves and big cans of fuel wrapping it all up in a tarp before they loaded us in and we zoomed off. A few minutes later, we came over another crest and saw a big milky white lake stretching across the desert between the mountains — La LagunaBlanca. Descriptive name… We pulled into a little cluster of buildings and wandered inside away from the blasting cold wind and sat down for breakfast. More mate de coca and the typical Bolivian bread, butter, and jelly. A little later, the day really got going. Every half hour or so we’d stop at a different completely unexpected sight. Next was the Laguna Verde– a beautiful turquoise color I’ve never seen before in the wild. They say it’s that color because the waters are laden with minerals. It’s a completely sterile lake — the main mineral is arsenic. A little later, we passed el Desierto de Dali named for its Daliesque shaped rocks spaced at very regular intervals. Later was a hot spring right at the edge of a half frozen salt lake/ salt flat. Every so often, a blast of wind would blow a huge cloud of white salt dust high into the deep blue sky. That reminds me. The skies here where unbelievable. By day, they were absolutely the bluest I’ve ever seen and by night you wouldn’t believe how many stars there were. Over lunch at the hot springs, I got to know my fellow travellers a bit better. In my car, there was an Argentina mother and son, an absolutely riotous french Canadian couple, and a Brazilian girl about my age. In the other car, there were three Spanish guys who I got to know pretty well — we ended up travelling together after (more on that later…) and two Germanwomen who were pretty quiet at first. I think they felt pretty terrible because they came from Santiago at sea levelstraight up to where we were — around 15,000 ft there. I guess human bodies don’t like that much. After lunch we headed on a ways more, climbing higher into the mountains until we came to places snow came across the road. A few turns later, we dropped back into a valley filled with geysers — Los Geiseres Mañana delSol. These were completely different from the one near San Pedro. Here, they were big holes a few feet deep with boiling grey mud at the bottom. Around the tops, there were crusts of ice where the steam had frozen and in the air was a very heavy sulphuric scent. Leaving the geysers, we went up a really rough rocky two track until we came over a pass just above 16,000 ft. The Germans really didn’t like that… The next 45 minutes were all down hill. Donato, our driver loved the downhills. I don’t know how fast we went because I could never tear my eyes away from the tiny, sandy, rocky road as he rocketed down at heart-stopping speeds. Finally, we slowed as we got to some deep sand flats approaching the next stop. We had arrived at the Laguna Colorada– now it was just a browning red, but they said that in the early morning before the wind starts, it’s a bright blood red due to an algae that only grows there. The shores were crusted white with borax and far out in the middle, you could see hundreds of flamingos. The last leg of the drive was a few hours broken a couple times by stops to fix the other car… uh oh! Finally as the sun was getting low in the sky, we pulled into a little town called Villa Mar and unloaded all of our stuff into a very… rustic (one might say) hostel. The mattresses were about an inch and a half thick and it was already VERY cold in the room though it hadn’t even started cooling down outside. There was no hot water and they told us that we’d only have electricity from about 6:30 until 9. We spent an hour or so wandering around the town finding a way up to the top of the cliffs overlooking town finding llama corrals, a pig pen, and the remains of a crashed Bolivian air force plane. After the sun was down, it started getting cold FAST, so we headed back to the hostelwhere they had lit a fire in the wood stove. Though I had been with the people in my car all day and we were getting along great, I started to get to know the guys from the other car much better. They broke out a deck of cards (I guess Spanishcards are different… they don’t have clubs, diamonds, hearts, and spades — they have knives, gold coins, and other stuff). We had a great time together over a couple bottles of wine and a dinner of delicious Bolivian soup (they really have their soup down in Bolivia!) and a pile of pasta. After dinner, just as we were getting started on another game of cards, their words were true. We heard a motor start sputtering outside and the lights dimmed and went out. I guess it was okay because it gave us plenty of time to get a good night’s sleep.
The next morning, we got up bright and early and drove all day through dramatic canyons, up into the mountains, and out into the desert. The pace was much more relaxed, so we got to actually get out and climb around on the rocks or take goofy pictures and generally just not be sitting the whole time in the car. I think that for me the highlight of the day was when we pulled into a ghost town called Julaca where we crossed the Uyuni-Antofagasta, Chile rail line. I guess back in it’s day, it was a bustling water stop on the railroad, but now with the dieselengines, there was nothing left for families to do there. It was sort of spooky wandering around. It was almost like something from a movie — old falling apart adobe buildings with narrow streets. In the doorways everywhere you’d look, there were little sand drifts. It was so ghostly quiet that you could hear the sand blowing across the ground when the wind would gust. That was the last stop of the day. Two hours later, we pulled in to a hostel right on the shore of the Uyuni salt flat. This one was luxurious! Tepid water, three blankets apiece, and electricity until ELEVEN THIRTY!
Our last morning, we got up early again and headed out onto the blinding white salt flat. As the mountains behind us shrank, it seemed like we were headed out across an endless stretch of white until after 45 minutes a little island suddenly appeared in front of us. As we pulled up, we could see it was basically just a heap of dark rock covered in huge cactus. We climbed up to the top and the view was spectacular. The deep blue sky witha stark contrast with the white salt was amazing. Way, way off in the distance you could occasionally spot a little black speck racing across the white — other 4wd tours. On the way down, we spotted several vizcachas, a sort of rabbit-esque brown animal with a long tail. Maybe related to a chinchilla? We spent another couple hours driving across the salt flat towards the opposite side seeing the mountains ahead gradually rising up until we came up to a “salt hotel” completely built of salt blocks carved out of the flat. They said that in the middle, the salt was up to 8 meters thick! Another interesting thing that they told us was that when it rains, the salt flat isn’t actually perfectly flat, so the water puddles in the lower places, then the puddles drift around on the surface with the wind until they dry up. I would love to see it after rain… On the way out, we also stopped at a place where they scrape up bits of salt to later sell. Finally coming out, we had another 30 minutes or so on a dirt road until the town of Uyuni. Our very last stop was the old steam train cemetery in Uyuni before they turned us all loose. I almost didn’t know what to do! The past 3 days had been completely 100% planned and now I didn’t have someone to tell me when to eat, when to get in the car, etc ,etc!
Oh well. We managed. Everyone from the group managed to run into each other (in the huge booming metropolis Uyuni is) and we all ate lunch at a pizza place togehter. I decided to stick with the Spanish guys (Nacho, Victor, and Eduardo and the Brazilian girl, Samantha) to go to Potosi. That afternoon before the bus, I managed to get my visa all straightened out (nothing $135 won’t do!) and caught up on what was happening in the outside world. That evening, we got on the bus and took another ridiculously bumpy road for the next six hours. That part of the world is running low on paving machines I guess. We pulled in to Potosi around 1am and the five of us piled into a taxi with all our stuff and headed for the hostel. The next morning we got up and wandered around the city for a while shopping for mine tours and just soaking in the sites. We stopped by the market and bought coca leaves for the altitude and found some empanadas for a whopping 14 cents, then headed up a hill for an overlook of the town. It was a pretty beautiful town. I’m sure you know that it used to be the richest city in the world because of the silver mines and you can definitely still see it in the beautiful colonial architecture. There’s huge mansions, beautifully lanscaped plazas, and incredibly intricately designed churches. We spent a good amount of time studying Bolivia’s culinary offers — our first lunch in Potosi cost us about $2 and was four courses AND included a beer apiece. First was bread and a little salad, then another delicious soup, a HUGE entree of spicy beef and noodles, then a chunk of papaya to finish it all off. That night, we went to a slightly more expensive place and tried spicy vizcachaand I found my new favorite Bolivian dish — it’s called pique a lo macho. You’re going to think it sounds gross, and it does. But you’ll have to take my word for it, it’s actually delicious. It all starts witha pile of french fries on a plate. On top you get a big pile of juicy seasoned beef or llama mixed withonions, peppers, and sliced hot dog. The whole thing is topped with thinly sliced cheese and deathly hot chilis. Mmm!
The next morning, we woke up bright and early for our mine tour. We made sure to pick a good company — visiting the mines almost seems like companies are profiting off other people hardships, but the company we chose donates a percentage of its profits to a miners healthcare center and takes tourists to the miners market. That was our first stop. In the miners market, we bought bottles of soft drinks, bags of coca leaves, and sticks of dynamite at $3 a pop (haha, get it?!) as gifts for the miners we’d meet. Going into the mine turned out to be bothphysically and emotionally draining. The entrances are way high up to start with– around 14,000 ft, an altitudethat already takes your breathaway, but as you go in it gets hotter and hotter (until it’s over 100 degrees!) and the tunnels get narrower and tighter. There’s no ventilation, so there’s very little oxygen. In fact, there was too little oxygen to light a lighter inside. All the people moving through kick up dust and you can smell chemicals in the air. I’m sure you’re breatinng things that should never ever enter human lungs.
The mine is constructed in levels so that it’s relatively flat for miners to push two ton carts of mineral out (nothing is mechanized here). We squeezed down several narrow nearly vertical passages until we arrived at the 4th level (hotter still) and we got to actually talk to some of the miners. They had all been working there for 30-odd years and had all started between the ages of 12 and 14. They say it’s still common for children to start at that age. I couldn’t believe it. A couple hours later, we madeour way back up to the top feeling like our lungs were going to explodethe whole way. Finally when we were all out came the last part – we got to play withthe dynamite! The guide showed us how to fit the fuse and where to put the extra ammonia nitrate and all for the “mejorexplosion!”. We had 2 minutes for to take goofy pictures, then the guidewent sprinting down the mountain withit and after another minute, there was a flash and a deafening boom as it blew up. Who ever knew tourism would involve playing with dynamite?
That afternoon, we headed to Sucre another few hours away by collective taxi. Our driver was great — he told us all about everything we drove by and even stopped for us to get out to take photos. I’ve never met someone so friendly. Sucre was another beautiful colonial city. Everything was painted white. We spent a lot of time just wandering around the streets, up to an overlook where we got an “americanbreakfast”: a passion fruit and milk smoothie, toast withbutter and jelly, three fried eggs with bacon, a large mediterraneansalad, and finally a cup of fruit with yogurt. However un-american, it was pretty delicious after hiking up the hill! We also visited a textiles museum that was pretty cool. It told all about the history of Bolivian weaving and what the weavings acutally represented. I thought they were just pictures animals and things, but they have history and everything in them.
The next night, we hopped on an overnight bus for La Paz. 12 hours later, we got there and found a hostel (less than $4 a night…). We spent most of the day wandering around and the guys did a whole lot of shopping. We walked through the city to a park that was brand new since the last time I was there. It had a walkway all the way up to this point that rises up in the middle of the city that allowed you an amazing 360 degree view of the town sloping up the sides of the bowl it’s set in. That night, we went to a peña which was recommended to us by one of the stores we had been in. Peñas are pretty common in Bolivia and northern Argentina. Basically, it’s a sort of club where a band starts playing music, but as it gets later, the band slows down and the patrons take up instruments made available by the bar and a complete jam-fest gets going. Tons of fun — music, dancing. The next morning, I woke up feeling like the swine flu train had hit me. In fact, the spanish guys all swore I must have had swine flu, but I think it must have been just a cold maybe caused by whatever it was we had breathed in at the mines in Potosi. Either way, I went to the pharmacy and said what my symptoms were. The pharmacist tossed me a little packet of unlabled pills and said to take one every 8 hours, saving the blue one for night. I guess the system is pretty different in Bolivia. Who needs a prescription? Who needs labels on pills? It said anti-flu… Anyway, I trusted her and it seemed to do the trick. I slept well and woke up feeling a thousand times better the next day. Our big day!
We had breakfast at 7 and then changed into biking clothes — we were biking down the wold’s most deadly road. It’s called the Yungas Cruz road which links La Paz to the Yungas, one of the main coca growing regions of the country. We all hopped on nice mountain bikes at the top of a pass around 15,000 ft, way up in the snow and started racing down the road. The first hour or so was paved, relatively wideand absolutely frigid, but once we started the second part things changed. The road was a rough dirt track now weaving through the forest, but a few minutes later, we came out on the sideof a mountain and the road got thinner yet. The edge got steeper and steeper until we got to places where we couldn’t see the bottom because of clouds below us. Every 10 or 15 minutes, we stopped because the guides said otherwise the less experienced riders hands would go numb from the vibrations and they wouldn’t be able to stop. That was fine withme… I wasn’t ready for anyone to fall off the cliff. There were no guardrails to stop you or anything. Each stop they’d tell us about the next few curves and say “oh, this is where the Israeli girl fell off,” or “two months ago, a British guy died here,” or “a few years back, two people were killed when a truck came around that curve two fast and ran over their bikes.” I thought it was only that dangerous for cars! It sure scared us into slowing down a bit… not much though, the guidein the front rocketed down the whole way. At one point, the road was actually carved into the cliff — we were under and overhang and to our left the road dropped off who knows how far and the cliff above seemed endless as well. All along, we’d rideacross little rivers or places where waterfalls cascaded down straight into the road. At one place where we stopped to let a car by, we realized that people actually drive on the left so that the driver can be on the cliff side where he can guage distance better. After another hour on the dirt, we started coming out of the clouds and the weather began to change. It got hot, so we stripped off jackets and things and put them into the bus. Another hour so later, we were finishing — it was dusty and we were in full sunshine. What a change! At last, after one little uphill, we pulled into a hostel where they had a pool, showers, clean towells, and even a little soap bar and packet of shampoo! Utmost luxury. After everyone was clean and cooled off, there was an endless buffet lunch — just what we needed. Finally after everyone had digested and the bikes were loaded into the bus, we headed back up. I sat on the downhill side and we were finally going a speed where I could take more of the surroundings in. I think actually the bikes were able to make it down way faster than a car can just because they’re more agile and have better breaks and can make the turns faster. The scenery going back was so beautiful. Nearly jungle, up to cold, lush cloud forest, then into the high mountain grasslands and finally up into the snow. On the dirt part at least, it seemed like we passed a cross every few hundred feet. Pretty incredible. It’s good to know now that the road is really only used by tourists on bikes. They have a new safer paved road that makes the connection between the Yungas and La Paz now.
Early the next morning, the spanish guys headed for Copacabana on Lake Titicaca. I opted for one more day in La Paz since I’ve been to Copacabana and there were a few more things I wanted to do in the city that I missed when I was sick anyway. Unfortunately, one of those things was a photo museum that I never could find! It definitely wasn’t where my book said and everyone I asked had absolutely no idea. Hmm. I ended up having a pretty relaxing day and even treated myself to a more luxurious hostel (best shower I’ve had in all of South America!) but still only payed $7. I love Bolivia’s prices…
Yesterday morning, I got up early and got on a bus from La Paz to Cusco. It was supposed to be a quick ride arriving around 7, but it seemed to take FOREVER. First, we had a flat tire before we were even out of La Paz, then the border crossing was ridiculously disorganized, so it took forever to get across, then finally only an hour from Cusco, we had ANOTHER flat tire. This time it got repaired fast because passengers just wanted to get to their destination. A bunch of people piled out of the bus and helped out. We finally pulled in at the Cusco bus terminal around 10. I had been hoping to make it all the way to Urubamba, but there was no way. All the collective taxis and busses stopped at 8. I had called my old host family from Puno and they said just call when I arrive, so I did. Jesus (host father) said that luckily Carlos (brother) was in town at their Cusco apartment, so he gave me his cell. I called and got directions and before 10:15, I was there catching up on old times. Carlos had an early class the next day, so we headed to bed around 10:30 after a tea. This morning I woke up and grabbed a colectivo to Urubamba and got to see Jesus. Lupe (host mom) is out of town in Lima visiting the other brother, Yurmo who just moved there for postgrad. She’ll be back tomorrow though. They have another volunteer at home now, so I don’t want to impose too much. She’s leaving tomorrow, so I get to have the family to myself after then. But it’s great to be back! Not much has changed, it still seems like good ole Urubamba. Tomorrow I hope to meet up withJaime, my good friend who I worked with, and I’d love to get into the community to see how the agrotourism project is doing. I think I’ll take it easy here for the weekend and then it’ll be about time to head back to Santiago. Probably I’ll go back through Arequipa to see the Colca Canyon (deeper than the grand canyon!) and then to a little town on the Peruvian coast before crossing into Chile. I hope that I have time to go down the coast stopping a few times, there’s supposed to be some nice towns. It would be brutal to go direct from the border — 30 hours! We’ll see.
Anyway, that’s it for now. Tomorrow’s exactly two weeks from the day I leave. I can’t believe it! It seems so soon! I almost feel like I only arrived here in South America a couple weeks ago, but it’s been 5 and a half months. Wow.
Well, more later…
