jeudi 31 décembre 2015

Cochabamba: Christmas time

I arrived in Cochabamba after an horrendous bus ride that ended up in the back of a truck.

The plan in Cochabamba was to mark a break from the travelling and stay calm for a bit in order to enjoy Christmas and get our things together to plan the rest of the trip and what we wanted for the future.

Geo was already in Cochabamba for just more than a week when I arrived. He had found a good way to stay there for almost no money. The plan was to stay in a social care institution and help with a few tasks in exchange of a room and one meal for less than two pounds a day. Of course it came with a few rules: no visitors, the doors closing at 10 p.m. and no alcohol allowed. Perfect place for a real rest :) .

A view of Cochabamba from the laguna close to La Casa del Migrante
The idea for Geo was to prepare the "after trip" as he could see its savings disappearing quickly. And for me it was to look for an option to come back to Europe on a sailing boat and improve my Spanish through a few lessons (Link of the school).

During our time at the "Casa del Migrante" (name of the institution) we met great and simple people that often had nothing. Spent nights chatting about politics with our new friends Guido and Juan-Pablo. It was interesting to be in an environment very different to the habitual backpacking scene. Almost all the people staying there were working in markets selling food or things and didn't have family (which is THE social circle in Bolivia) so they didn't have the money to have a place to themselves. There was people from all different ages, from 18 to 80. For them it was as little as 50 pence per day to stay including one meal. A great institution only relying on private funds and payments from the residents. The place was working with every resident being assigned a task: cleaning, making food, do the dishes. In this way no personal was needed.

Christmas was approaching, Eduardo one of the guys in charge made a "beautiful" Christmas tree out of recycled plastic bottles while listening to some amazing retro techno tunes.


We had a very simple Christmas with the residents. Just a meal a bit better than usual and for desert some Panetone (as weird as it is this Italian Christmas bread is the tradition in Bolivia) and a bit of Cider. We had made some pies but they didn't encounter a big success on the Christmas meal as it is not in the traditions to eat pies for Christmas. The Christmas dinner happened very quickly, nobody really seemed to care or to speak much. It was only once at the dessert that people started to celebrate a bit and get together. Speaking with my Spanish teacher about that I learned the reason. Food in Bolivia is really strictly for nutritional purpose there is no chatting or sharing during the meals, it is only after when you open a beer or make a brew that people start to interact.

Panetone and Cider!
The kids
Anyway after the dinner Geo and I managed to escape and got a special permission to stay a bit later than 10 ;) we went to the local tienda to share a beer and celebrate our little Christmas.

Christmas time under 30 degrees
One of the biggest attraction in Cochabamba is also the giant market called La Vega. It is a lot of fun to spend a few hours and get lost int the maze of shops. It is just like another city in the city and if you have time you can find almost anything.

One shop
Some pics of Cocha:


Cochabamba from el Cristo
El Cristo de la Concordia 



The flying:

The good thing about Cochabamba is that it is also one of the best places to fly in Bolivia or one of the most accessible to fly distance. But for the first time in the trip we had some trouble flying because of the weather. For the first time in 5 months spent in the Andes more or less in rainy season we had some proper rain and bad weather. Anyway we managed to find a few days to go flying with the very welcoming paragliding scene.
Cocha from the air
The first flying day we had, we had the chance to be there for a price giving ceremony. So in spite of the good conditions we had some barbecue and beers at the landing site.


Winners!
The real ones :)
The team

We also witnessed a weird tradition which is to beat the new pilots (fort heir first flight) with a stick as an initiation ritual.
The ritual

On the next day the weather looked more promising, so we teamed up with a super nice local pilot named German to try to go cross country.

Getting Ready
Double German

The conditions were really light and the cloud base pretty low. We boated around take off with Geo watching German going for its first turn point at the east of take off. We eventually followed him, but the day wasn't the easiest with strong bubbles and no well formed thermals.

Spot the glider

I managed a little cross country of 13km. The TRACK. German managed a flight of 40km in total well done to him!!




Bonus Pic:

El Conejo with sausage and stick

mardi 22 décembre 2015

Potosi and Sucre: Quick stops in Bolivia Historical Highlights

Back to the writing after a long period passed far from the computer screens. Not easy to keep a writing rythm and sometimes it is good to take a break :) .

Anyway, back from my Uyuni tour my goal was to get to Cochabamba where Geo was spending some time looking for a job for the future. On my way I decided to make a few stops.

First I stopped in one of the most historical city of Bolivia: Potosi.
Potosi is a relatively small city situated in the south of Bolivia in the so-called Bolivian Tin-Belt, the city itself is located at the impressive altitude of 4067 m.a.s.l. making Potosi one of the highest cities in the world.
The city is known for its mining activity, indeed Potosi is home to the Cerro Rico (litteraly rich mountain) which is the world's largest silver depot. Potosi has been mined since the sixteenth century continually which transformed the surroundings of the mountain in large gravel stocks and old derelict mining plants and machinery.

Potosi and the Cerro Rico
A bit of history.
After the arrival of the Spanish Conquistadors and the change of the little Andes hamlet into a big mining centre Potosi became the major colonial-era supplier of silver for Spain. Potosí was directly and tangibly associated with the massive import of precious metals to Seville, which precipitated a flood of Spanish currency and resulted in globally significant economic changes in the 16th century.
By the 17th century Potosi had become one of the largest cities in the world relying on the work of Spanish colons and  more importantly indigenous slaves forced to work in the mines.
By the end of the 19th century low silver prices prompt the change to mining tin. The mine worked till 1985 when the tin market crashed leading to massive layoffs in miners.
Now the mines are working under a cooperative system. Each mine or "hole" in the mountain belong to a cooperative and the miners are shareholders in their cooperative. The work is still really hard and even harder than it was a few decades ago as the ores contain less and less of the wanted minerals and require to go deeper and deeper.

Cerro Rico's minerals
My idea in Potosi was to try to fly off from the famous Cerro Rico. I thought that once again it would give me the opportunity to see the place from a different perspective. The other reason is that I didn't want to be part of one of these mine tours that basically take you down the rat holes while people are working (and often childrens). For me this was voyeurism tourism. A big group of wealthy tourist going down the mine for an hour to take pictures of the poor miners, hmmm is this really right?!? In the mean time it is the good occasion to make a reality check. Anyway I decided not to go and to go looking for a take off instead.



Cerro Rico
The day was nice and clear, but the wind and the thermal didn't seem to be on my side. Moreover the big stack of mine rejects and old mining instalation that is Potosi didn't seem to be the nicest environment for a flight. As I was climbing into the mining area a miner came to speak to me. He offered me to take me in the mines for less than half the price the mining tours are asking. Hmm I hesitated, I was there and furthermore it was Sunday, the resting day, so no miner would be down in themines working. After a last bargaining on the price I decided to go.
I went down with Jonnie a young miner that was already father of three kids.

Getting into the mine
Jonnie took me around for a quick tour in the mine. Not much time down there was necessary to realize how hard the work conditions are. Moving up and down the galleries was challenging and involved climbing. Not the easiest thing with welly-boots about three sizes too short.


Sometimes we had to pass under stacks of rocks in order to continue. Thousands of tons retained by a few planks...


It was like caving but in a man made environment. It is just incredible to think that some guys are working six days a week for the whole day drilling and carrying rocks by hand in 2015.

Jonnie showed me the mine God called the "Tio". Apparently the Tio has been brought to the indigenous people working there by the Conquistadors. The Spanish seeing that many slaves weren't working properly introduced this mine's God to boost up their work by introducing a pressure from an "higher instance". And it worked! The workers started to worship the statue and called it Tio by deformation as they couldn't pronounce properly Dios (God in Spanish). Nowadays even if most of the miners know the origin of the Tio, it is still a key figure of the mine. And the miners get together around the Tio to drink Alcohol (nearly pure alcohol!!) smoke cigarettes and refill in Coca leaves (indispensable for any miner).

The famous Tio
The coca leaves are used by the miners for three main reasons (Ihave been told):
1. It helps them with altitude and breathing
2. It stops the hunger
3. It is used as a clock. Every 3 hours the coca leaves are losing their taste it is time to have break and refill.

Another mine...
Coming out of the mine I met up with Jonnie's family living there in a little house just by the entry of the mine (about 8 person in one room). When I said I had a paraglider, one of Jonnie's sisters wanted me to take her for a flight. Next time when I'll have my tandem equipment.
Needless to say that it has been quite a mind-blowing experience to see these people's working conditions, I ended up my day by a good walk on the mountain in search for a take off that I never found and thinking on how privileged we are to live in developed countries.

The next stop on my road to Cochabamba was Sucre Bolivia's constitutional capital. I didn't stay long in Sucre as I purchased my ticket to Cochabamba directly in the bus terminal arriving from Potosi. But just as I got into town I already wished I was staying a bit longer.
Sucre is a very pleasant city with beautiful colonial buildings. Walking in the historical centre it is possible to see all the impressive private mansions which have been built by the rich mine owners.  The climate is pretty mediterranean.



In Sucre I just walked around enjoying the many churches and squares. Went to the beautiful market to enjoy some very good and varied local food (there actually is some delicious Bolivian food and not only fried chicken!!).

Sucre Mercado Central

The I embarked on one of the worst buses of the trip that took me from Sucre to Cochabamb. Don't take the cheap option if it is only 2 dollars less because you don't know what you are getting into! The 8 hours trip transformed into 20 hours trip and we finished the journey on the back of a truck, including young childrens and old ladies!












samedi 19 décembre 2015

The Uyuni Salt Flats and South Bolivia

So it was time for our travelling couple to go separate ways for a while.
I wanted to go see the mythical Uyuni Salt flats and the south of Bolivia that Geo had already experienced these regions a couple of years ago. So after an heart-rending farewell in the La Paz bus station I jumped in a night bus toward Uyuni.

I arrived in the early, very early morning in Uyuni. Hopefully as it wasn't the high season I didn't had to face too many agencies trying to sell me tours. I went straight to the market (the only place with decent prices in this tourist park) and enjoyed a nice coffee and cheese sandwich waiting for the agency I had booked my tour with to open.

At around 11 a.m. I jumped in the car that has been my ride for te next three days with the 6 other people part of the trip: two youngs Australian guys, a Bolivian family and the chaufeur.
We got going and headed to our first stop, the train cemetery featuring old British trains that were used to transport the mineral from the Andes towards the Chilean harbour of Antofagasta.




Our driver told us "10 minutes you can go down and take pictures". It was fun to see everybody taking the same silly pictures on the old machines. At the same time, it was for me quite a weird experience as it was my first organised tour of the trip. Being there, part of mass tourism made me feel a bit uncomfortable, but well, it is almost the only option to visit the salar on a budget if you are not ready to go by yourself cycling for a week into the desert.
A thing to know is that all the travel agencies propose exactly the same tour. So while you are on your own driving through the desert most of the day, you meet with the others agencies at all the "photo spots". I was sometimes thinking to myself, this place is sooo big couldn't they go to different places, but Bolivian tourism isn't usually very inventive.
Anyway, after this first stop we were on our way to the salar.




We visited the cactus islands on the middle of the salt flats.





And then went to take the usual salt flats pictures with optical illusions. On this occasion I got my glider out for a bit of fun and a few pics.




Riding godzilla
Before ending the day at our hostel we had a short visit to some caves on one of the "salar islands". It was very impressive as all the formations inside are actually petrified corals, showing the ancient nature of the salar: an ocean.


Thumbs
Then we finally got to our hostal. A cool building made of salt and cactus. It was very quiet as we were the only tourists in this place.A good night listening to the howling wind outside.

The salt hotel from outside
Inside the hotel



On the second day we departed early to go a bit further south, outside of the salar. This day has been long with a lot of driving, but also amazing landscapes. Firstly we saw the volcanic formations creating a lunar landscape.



Then the active volcanoes.


And finally a succession of amazing lagunas filled with flamingos on a volcanic background. Amazing!







The team
We passed by the famous "arbol de piedra". A rock formation created by wind erosion.




 Before carrying on on the road to the last and most beautiful of the laguna: "La laguna colorada"

On the road again
Laguna Colorada

This night we slept in a very basic accomodation in dorms. But the night was fun, we had a bit of wine and good discussions.
The next day we were on the road at 5 a.m. to go see the geysers. The morning drive was quite fun, looking a bit like a  race through the desert as all the cars from all agencies were speeding to get first at the spot.







After we drove to the Dali valley (said to have inspired Dali in his paintings) and the last lagunas of the trip.



Laguna Verde
At this point we were really close to Chile (San Pedro de Atacama) and a transfer was possible. I wish I had done that as it would have added a good reason to do this trip: use the tour as a transportation mean and pass to Chile.

Then we had a great bath in some thermal springs. Luckily our driver managed to time it right and we got the baths to ourselves!

Bath with a view!

There was more or less the end of the trip, keeping apart the last long drive back to Uyuni. This place is definitely very special, but I would say that the experience can be a bit spoiled by the mass tourism feel.

On the way back we stopped at a crazy place full of volcanic blocks, a rock climber dream!





Last meal

Bonus Pic: