Bad Roads and Bad News in Bolivia

De La Paz salimos para Oruro, una ciudad en el altiplano donde hacen un carnaval impresionante con mascaras de diablos, pero cuando llegamos nosotros no habia mucho ambiente de fiesta, porque hacia frio y estaba ventoso. Pasamos demasiado tiempo buscando un lugar para dormir, porque con -17 de temperatura no podiamos ni pensar en dormir en la camioneta. Todos los hoteles y hostales o eran muy sucios o muy caros, y se nos hizo muy dificil. Por fin encontramos un hotel viejo y grande, de otra epoca, con fotos de Charlie Chaplin en las paredes, y por suerte nos dieron como mil frasadas de lana para que no nos congelaramos. Se nota que en su momento era el hotel, pero en estos dias esta un poco mas que decaido. De maniana, despues de comer desayuno en un salon gigante y vacio (que nos hizo acordar a esa pelicula con Jack Nicholson, El Resplandor). Nos llevo mas de 20 minutos empezar la camioneta, que se ve que no le gusta para nada la altura. Desde ese dia, tuvimos que empezar la camioneta desconectando la bomba de nafta y usando una tapita poniamos gasolina directo al motor! Por lo menos funciono. Por suerte despues de bajar de la altura empezo a arrancar bien. Ese dia fuimos de Oruro a Potosi, la ciudad mas alta del mundo (4060 metros) y es patrimonio de la humanidad. Fundada en 1545 despues de descubrir muchas cantidades de plata en el Cerro Rica, es un lugar muy interesante y triste al mismo tiempo. Los horrores de las minas siguen hasta hoy en dia, y es imposible olvidar los millions de escalvos africanos e indigenas que murieron para mantener a la economia global por siglos. Estacionamos en un hotel recomendado por los amigos europeos que conocimos en Cusco, y pudimos dormir debajo de un techito (que nos ayudo mucho para protejernos del frio). Salimos a caminar por la ciudad, buscando un lugar para comer (se ve que los domingos cierra todo). Hay muchas agencias aca que ofrecen tours en 4x4 hasta el Salar de Uyuni y tambien para ver las minas en persona! Son cooperativas, donde los mineros trabajan todavia en condiciones horribles y viven pocos anios– algunos son ninios – para poder vender lo que sacan por medio de la cooperativa. Alli abajo, tienen altares para poner ofrendas a “El Tio” (tambien conocido como el Diablo) que es el que manda en el fondo de las minas. Los nenes querian hacer un tour (donde se pueden comprar regalos: cigarros, hojas de coca, y dinamita para ofrecer a los mineros) pero no teniamos tiempo. Al otro dia, cagados de frio, nos tomamos una sopita caliente en el mercado y salimos para el sur hacia el Salar de Uyuni. Nos dijeron que la ruta estaba muy bien (esta en el proceso de quedar pavimentada) pero la verdad es que aunque fue lindo el paisaje (altiplano y desierto) fue bastante dificil y muy estresante- Nos llevo cinco horas y media de caminos bien tortuosos para hacer 200 km. Llegamos a Uyuni antes de que oscureciera, y despues de buscar por un tiempo (parece que el turismo hizo que se inflaran los precios aca tambien – y cobran por persona normalmente, cosa que se nos hace muy caro para los 4) encontramos un lugar donde la duenia nos dio un buen precio para un cuarto con abundante agua caliente, y sabanas polares (y hasta TV con cable!). Esa noche salimos a comer a una pizzeria que es recomendada por todos los que pasan por Uyuni, el Minuteman, y la verdad es que son muy ricas pizzas y un ambiente muy comodo, con estufa a lenia y todo. Los duenios son una pareja joven, el de E.U. y de Bolivia, y a pesar de su exito ellos mismos pasan trabajando en el restaurant todos los dias. Despues de unas duchas calentitas y una buena noche de dormir, manejamos los 25 km que nos quedaban para entrar en el salar. Las fotos tendrian que alcanzar para explicar lo raro y espectacular que es ese lugar! Muy original – parece hielo y nieve, pero es pura sal – el salar mas grande del mundo, cubriendo 12,000 km2, es parte de un lago salado prehistorico que antes cubria casi todo el suroeste de Bolivia. Pasamos todo el dia manejando como locos (fue muy divertido porque es chato, como manejar en asfalto – las mejores calles de Bolivia!) y parando a cada rato para sacar fotos locas. Entramos como 80 km para llegar hasta la isla de los Pescadores, una isla en el medio del lago de sal cubierto de rocas y cactus gigantes (algunos tienen miles de anios). Despues de un partido de futbol con unos koreanos ciclistas, nos dimos la vuelta para volver a Uyuni. La idea era aprovechar la luna llena y quedarnos a dormir arriba de esa superficie de sal blanquita, pero la noche anterior hubieron -20 y no iba ser buena idea. Nos volvimos al mismo lugar para dormir, y al mismo restaurant para comer pizza y tomar limonada caliente. Esta vez nos enteramos que murio la Tia Tita. Ese mismo dia tuvo un ataque cardiaco en el hospital . Estabamos en shock. No podiamos creerlo, y pasamos esa noche y el otro dia con lagrimas. No podemos creer que no la vamos a escuchar mas. Asi que decidimos tratar de llegar a Uruguay lo antes posible, entonces al otro dia salimos para Tupiza en vez de volver a Potosi primero, porque pensamos que iba ser mas rapido. De ultima era un poco mas rapido, pero ese tramo de 200 km no era ni parecido a una ruta – en partes desaparecia la calle totalmente y tuvimos que manjear por un rio seco, con arena. En la mayoria del camino los lugares eran puro “serrucho” y no podiamos ir a mas de 20 o 30 km por hora. Despues de manejar 40 km, el amortiguador del lado izquierdo de adelante exploto! No quisimos volver para atras, asi que decidimos seguir. Paramos en el proximo pueblo, un pueblito de mineros en la mitad del camino a Tupiza, llamado Atocha. Un mecanico lo miro y dijo que no tenia el repuesto, pero manejando despacito podiamos llegar a Tupiza. Unas cuantas horas despues, y en un camino espantoso (que al final era lindo por lo menos, con caniones y cactus gigantes) llegamos a Tupiza: nos llevo 8 horas y media hacer 200 km! Aunque habiamos bajado un poco (a 2900 metros) igual era muy frio dormir en la camioneta, y encontramos un hostal barato para dormir. Gustavo llevo la camioneta para arreglar (tampoco tenian el amortiguador correcto, pero pusieron uno medio improvisado) y salimos a caminar un poco por el pueblo (famoso por los caniones con impresionantes formaciones de rocas, y por ser el lugar donde se muriorion Butch Cassidy y el Sundance Kid). Compramos unos empanadas “saltenias” y seguimos camino hacia Villazon, la frontera con Argentina. Otras 3 horas y media de malas carreteras de tierra (con muchisimos desvios por la arena y por campos enormes llenos de cactus) y por fin llegamos a la frontera con Argentina – la penultima frontera del viaje!

When we left La Paz we ended up driving for about 4 hours to reach the city of Oruro. This place is set in the middle of the altiplano and is well known for its carvaval, where people wear handcrafted “diablada” masks, dance and go crazy in the streets. When we got there it was definitely not the right season for a party atmosphere, but cold and windy. We spent a long time looking for a reasonable place to spend the night, as it was definitely too cold to sleep in the westy (it was supposed to go down to -17 that night). Everywhere seemed to be either too skuzzy or way too overpriced, but we finally settled on a large, old hotel with photos of Charlie Chaplin all over the walls that seemed to be stuck in time. In its glory days (circa 1950s) it must have been quite the place, and nowadays it is a bit run down and drafty, but at least they gave us about a thousand wool blankets so that we didn’t freeze to death. In the morning, after our complimentary continental breakfast in the fancy and empty dining room (which reminded us a bit of the hotel dining room in that Jack Nicholson movie The Shining) we spent about 20 minutes trying to get the westy started (it was either the cold or the altitude again, we were not sure which). In the end, for that day and for pretty much the rest of our time in Bolivia, we had to start the westy by bypassing the gas pump entirely, and adding gas manually with a little bottlecap into an air intake tube, before reconnecting the gas pump once it was going! Whatever works….Anyway, that day we drove from Oruro to Potosi, the highest city in the world (4060 metres!) and a Unesco Heritage Site. This is a very interesting city, founded in 1545 after the discovery of rich veins of silver in the Cerro Rico, with lots of colonial architecture and a real mining culture. The past and present horror associated with mining here is palpable, and it is impossible not to think about the millions of indigenous and African slaves who worked themselves to death to underwrite the Spanish economy (and by extension, the global one) for centuries. We parked the westy at a hotel that was recommended by some of our friends from Cusco, and that let us sleep in their parking lot under a little roof (so it was a bit less cold, at least) and went for a walk around town, looking for a place to eat. It took us quite a while because apparently everything closes on Sundays. There are many tour agencies in town who offer trips by 4X4 to the Uyuni salt flats and also, interestingly, into the (in)famous mines of Potosi! Apparently these are cooperative mines, where the miners work (still in shocking conditions) and sell what they manage to find to a smelter though the cooperative. The miners have frighteningly short lifespans, and some of them are even children. Down below, the miners worship and set up shrines to “El Tio” (aka the devil) to protect them – apparently god doesn’t have much jurisdiction down in the mines of Potosi. The kids were keen on a tour, part of which involves offering gifts of cigarettes, coca leaves, and sticks of dynamite to the miners, but we just didn’t have the time. The next day we had a nice hot soup for breakfast at the market and took off for Uyuni. We were told that the road was in pretty good condition, in the process of being paved (because of the crazy amount of tourists headed to Uyuni) but the 200 km stretch of highway was pretty terrible, and it took us 5 and ½ hours of bumpy, twisty, tortuous driving. The scenery was interesting, altiplano turning into desert, but it was not a very fun ride. We got to Uyuni before dark, and after searching for quite a long while (tourism has inflated the prices here too) found a place run by a lovely woman, who gave us a really good deal on a room with cable TV, hot water and flannel sheets! She was the only one who didn’t try to charge us a fortune by charging per person for a room. That night we went out to the highly (and often) recommended Minuteman restaurant for the best pizzas we have had in a long time, by any standards. Delicious! The place is very cosy too, with a wood stove and a very friendly, casual atmosphere. The owners are a young American/Bolivian couple who, despite the incredible success of the place, work in the restaurant themselves every day. They also have photos all over the walls that people have taken of themselves on the salt flats, taking advantage of the crazy lack of perspective that scenery offers. We got some good ideas for photos to take the next day when we went out onto the salt, and the owner Chris even lent Mateo a toy dinosaur to use as a prop. After a cosy, warm sleep and hot showers, we drove the 25 km out to the salt flats. The photos should be enough to explain how strange and wonderful it is there – it looks like ice and snow, but it is the world’s largest salt flat, blanketing 12,000 sq km! (part of a prehistoric salt lake that dried up but used to cover most of southwest Bolivia). Very neat. We spent the day driving (fast – it was like driving on asphalt! Best road in Bolivia!) and stopping to take funny photos. We made it about 80 km to Isla de los Pescadores, a rock covered “island” in the middle of the salt lake that is full of these huge catci (some of them are thousands of years old). After a rousing game of futbol with some very friendly Korean cyclists, we turned around and headed back to the edge of the salt. Since that night was the full moon, our original idea was to spend a night camping out on the huge, white salty surface, but as soon as we realized that it got down to -20 at night, we changed our minds and went back to the same hotel We also went back to the same restaurant for pizzas and hot lemonade. This is where we got the bad news. That same day Tia Tita had passed away of a heart attack while in the hospital. We were shocked. We spent the rest of that evening and the next day in tears, unable to believe that Tia Tita – an incredible character, an institution really – was gone. It is truly devastating for the entire family. Needless to say, the trip was no longer a priority and we started to make a beeline for Uruguay right away. The next day we braved the road to Tupiza, instead of going back to Potosi, because we thought it would be faster. In the end I think it was a bit quicker this way, but the 200 km stretch was barely even a road – it was pure washboard, which meant that you could not go faster than 20 or 30 km per hour, and in some places the road just seemed to disappear and you had to drive through a dried up, sandy river, almost getting stuck in a few places. About 40 km along, the shock absorber on the front left side exploded with a bang. Not wanting to go back, we decided to keep inching forward. We stopped in the next town (a small mining town called Atocha, about half way to Tupiza) and a mechanic looked at it and told us he had no replacement, but that as long as we drove slowly we would be okay to at least get to Tupiza. After a long, slow, torturous drive (which in the end turned into beautiful canyon and cactus scenery, at least) we finally got to Tupiza: in the end it had taken us 8 hours to drive 200 km! Even though we had gone down quite a bit (to 2,900 metres) it was still too cold to sleep in the car, so after a quick bit to eat we found a cheap hostel and crashed into bed. The next morning Gustavo managed to replace the shock absorber, although it is a temporary measure as it is apparently not the right size. We walked around the town a bit, buying some “saltenias” (empanadas with potato and chicken “soup” in them- it is a mystery how they do this) for breakfast. This place is famous for its beautiful canyons and as the place where the legendary Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid had their final stand off. By noon we were ready to take off again, and we headed straight for Villazon on the border with Argentina. Another 31/2 hours of bad, dirt roads (also in the process of being paved) with many dusty detours through cactus country, we got to the border – our second last border-crossing of the trip!