Magical Lake Titicaca

Greg and I spent 3 days around Lake Titicaca, one of the highest navigable lakes in the world.

We took a small boat to Isla del Sol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isla_del_Sol), hiked from the north to the south and stayed the night in a room that overlooked the beautiful lake. It truly is a magical place and the fresh air cleared our heads from the smog in La Paz.

After a short boat ride back to land, we ran to a bus filled with tourists and offically ended our 1 month and 3 day stay in Bolivia. I passed through customs with a smile but Greg was left behind with Bolivian hands in his pockets.

We joyously crossed the border by foot, exchanged our Bolivianos for Soles and made our way into Peru.

Next stop Cusco!

Now that we are in Peru, let's summarize Bolivia

We came in Bolivia with great expectations,we liked Evo Morales, the scenery is fantastic...
The first look at La Paz is surreal, it is a huge brown city in the middle of the mountains.
The way people are driving is our big problem here. Car drivers would not stop for a pedestrian. So, it is always a sort of adventure to cross a street.
The food is a good surprise! We were told that in Bolivia, it is rice and bean everyday, with an egg on Sundays. That cannot be more wrong. First of all, we never had beans, and the food was very good, even on treks. In La Paz, there is an excellent restaurant named ¨La Comedie¨, the owner, Bernard, is a french expatriate who has no will to come back to France, loves to live in Bolivia and makes good food.

The people in La Paz appeared to us as timid and distant. We did not feel that in Cochabamba for example, we were told that it is common for the people from the altiplano.

Our experience as volonteers in the CAICC was great. I am glad we did that because we had a real, warm contact with Bolivians.

The Salar de Uyuni is spectacular! We were with 2 frenchs on a world tour, Elo and Paulo, http://www.aufeuagauche.com/

Potosi was our next stop. It is famous for its silver mines. We discovered the way of life of a Bolivian miner, chewing coca, drinking a 90% alcool, smoking non-filtered cigarrette, and using dynamite instead of having lunch. Surprisingly, I do not fill the job requirement to be a miner, I am too tall, "c'est la vie!".

We finished Bolivia with the Lake Titicaca, I felt impressed when I saw this huge lake so high in the mountain. The little hike we did on the Isla del sol was beautiful.

Heading to Peru, the Bolivian customs succeded in extorquing 40 Bolivianos to me because I stayed 3 days too much. I gave them a kiss and say goodbye.

Now we are in Peru, some other great adventures are ahead of us...

Mine Crawling

Along with our new friends Paul and Elody, we headed north to a city called Potosi to visit the famous mines.

The bus trip to Potosi was an interesting 7 hour ride that was truly Bolivian at heart. Bumpy dirt roads, quick stops for people to pee on the side of the road and our personal favorite, the tire change.

Potosi was once a thriving city, founded in 1546 as a mining town, it soon produced fabulous wealth, becoming one of the largest cities in the Americas and the world with a population exceeding 200,000 people.

It is from Potosí that most of the silver shipped through the Spanish Main came. According to official records, 45,000 tons of pure silver were mined from 1556 to 1783. Of this total, 7,000 tons went to the Spanish monarchy. Indian labour came to die by the thousands, not simply from exposure and brutal labor, but by mercury poisoning: in the patio process the silver-ore, having been crushed to powder by hydraulic machinery, was cold-mixed with mercury and trodden to an amalgam by the native workers with their bare feet. The mercury was then driven off by heating, producing deadly vapors.

To compensate for the diminishing indigenous labor force, the colonists made a request in 1608 to the Crown in Madrid to begin allowing for the importation of 1500 to 2000 African slaves per year. An estimated total of 30,000 African slaves were taken to Potosí throughout the colonial era. African slaves were also forced to work in the Casa de la Moneda as acémilas humanas (human mules). Since mules would die after couple of months pushing the mills, the colonists replaced the four mules with twenty African slaves.

After 1800 the silver mines became depleted, making tin the main product. This eventually led to a slow economic decline. Still, the mountain continues to be mined for silver to this day. Due to poor worker conditions (lack of protective equipment from the constant inhalation of dust), the miners still have a short life expectancy with most of them contracting silicosis and dying around 40 years of age. It is estimated that, in the past years of indigenous labour, roughly 8 million Indians died, "eaten" by the mountain Cerro Rico (Rich Hill)

PS - The city of San Luis Potosí in Mexico was named after Potosí in Bolivia. In the United States, the name Potosi was optimistically given to lead-mining towns of Potosi, Wisconsin and Potosi, Missouri, and also to the silver-mining town of Potosi, Nevada.

HISTORY LESSON OVER =)

Arrival to Potosi takes your breath away, it is claimed to be the highest city in the world at a nominal 4,090 m (13,420 feet).

We found a great hostel (Koala Den) for super cheap with cable and HOT water! It was central a a short walk to the main plaza and pedestrian mall. The next day we hooked up with Elody and Paul to go on the mine tour.

First, they dress you in a smashing yellow getup, including a matching hard hat. The first stop was at the miners market, where the groups buy gifts for the miners. The miners chew coca leaves by the pound, which helps them work longer hours without eating or resting (to learn more about coca chewing: http://www.cocamuseum.com/htm/chewing.htm ). We bought a bag of coca leaves, cigarrettes, cookies (for the kids) and because a mine visit would not be complete without it, dynamite.

On arrival to the Cerro Rico, we are shown how the mines are divided into cooperatives and the various roles people play on the mountain. Women and children work outside the mines, cleaning and preparing minerals. The indegenous custom does not allow women to work inside the mines, because of the strong connection to Pacha Mama (mother earth). Pacha Mama would get jealous with too much female energy! However, exceptions are made for tourists.

The men work in groups of 10 to 12, each with specific roles. Level 4 and 3 miners work the shit jobs pushing carts and all hard labor, while level 2 miners handle dynamite and work meters below the others and level 1 miners ar usual the cooperative owners and often do not work at all, just supervise. The richer the cooparative is, the more tools they can afford. A poor cooperative works only by hand. To add to the misery of the working conditions, only the cooperative owner gets government covered health care and the workers are left undeclared. (note that the life expectancy of a miner is 40 years)

After the dynamite show (which turned out to be much more explosive than we all expected), we headed towards the mine entrance.

After going down just one short flight of stairs, I began to feel my chest tighten and my heart picked up. Both Paul and I looked at each other and said, ¨It´s cool, we will wait for you guys up top.¨ The guide did a good job at convincing us this was a once in a lifetime experience and we took a deep breath (seperated so we would not scare each other) and climbed down further.

As it turns out, I could comfortably work in a mine. While Greg and the others strained their necks to bend down through the small passages, I strolled along with my head held high.

Inside miners work tediously away by hand with picks, pushing trolleys, and shoveling minerals into bins to be lifted up. Others climbed up and down through small holes barley large enough for me to climb through. It was an interesting but upseting expereince, as one cannot imagine these working conditions could exists today.

I am not sure how long we were down in the mine, but the entire group breathed a sigh of relief when we climbed back out into the blinding light.

Still curious? check out these links.....

http://www.thedevilsminer.com/index_new.html

http://www.docsonline.tv/Grito%20di%20piedra/index.htm

http://www.slate.com/id/2149482/

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

After 2 exciting weeks of hard work we found ourselves on vacation, again. Cochambamba was an amazing experience, one that we will never forget.

We left early morning to catch a train a few hours south in Oururo. In usual form, we had no reservations. We stood in front of a blank face employee for 10 minutes while he typed into his computer to be told that the train was full. There was another couple in our same position so the 4 of us sat around waiting to see if any spots would open up. The heavens parted and 4 seats were at last given to us, in ¨fancy¨ class.

The train rambled down to the town of Uyuni at a pleasant speed. The views were nice and the food car (although steaming hot) was a nice place to pass the 6 hour ride chatting with our new (french) friends.

On arrival the 4 of us found a cheap place to stay and decided to meet in the morning to find a tour together. We left the very next morning on a 4 day trip to see the various sights around Uyuni and of course, visit the salt flats. The tour is usually 3 days, but we extended it to 4, cut out 2 other passengers and did the trip inversed. This worked great because we had plenty of space in the 4x4 truck, plenty of time to see everything, and less tourists in our photo shoots. Our guide was also the driver, mechanic and cook, which was interesting at times....

We saw endless desert landscape sprinkled with random volcanic rocks and lagoons. Flamingos flock to this area because of the rich soil and shallow lagoons. The hospedajes we stayed in were basic and on the last night we stayed in a hotel made of salt.

The last day was by far the most breathtaking as we tumbled out of bed at 5am to watch the sunset over the salt flats. The salt flats reach far and the vision is impressive. Once we had some coffee in us, we spent a good 45 minutes trying to capture funny pictures.......

By the 4th day we were professional Uno players, discovered the limits of Bolivian wine and had made 2 new friends.