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Saturday 26th April
We had a very cool day. We visited two museums, the first was the Textile and Ethnographic museum run by a foundation called ASUR. The foundation was set up to preserve the ancient methods of weaving in the indigenous communities around the Sucre region. They have set up many workshops in rural communities where women (and some men) make weavings using traditional methods, and then they are sold through ASUR at the museum shop and other outlets, with the profits being used to train more weavers.
Anyway, the museum was absolutely fantastic. It had a combination of ancient (1600-odd years old) to modern day weavings from several different ethnic groups from around the region. They also had english translations for all the explanations (which was really helpful). It was fascinating to learn how the weaving is done and how it has evolved from 1,000´s of years ago to the present day, and to learn about the differences between the weavings of the different ethnic groups. We purchased two weavings so you´ll all be able to see how cool they are when we get home – it´s like each time you look at them you discover something new in them.
In the afternoon we went and visited the Museum Charcas, which has collections of contemporary art (i.e. more religous paintings), and colonial furniture. But the best bit was their achaeological collection, which consisted of a cool collection of tools, household implements and weapons from Pre-Incan cultures and a huge ceramics collection from several different ethnic groups from around the region covering the last 3,500 or so years. It was fascinating to see the progression of design and decoration of the ceramics, and how different they were in each area.
Friday 25th April
We had a good sleep-in this morning and didn´t get out of bed until 10am! Alter brekkie at a café on the main plaza (Plaza 24 De Mayo). It was 1200 by the time we had finished brekkie, and all the museums and a lot of the shops etc shut between 1200-1230 & 1400-1500, so we went and found an Internet café and update our blog and check emails etc.
We then decided to go and visit the central market, where you can buy pretty much anything under the sun – if you know where to go. The fruit and vege stalls were pretty cool, such a variety, but not a lot that we didn´t recognise - and so cheap. There is also a meat and fish market (minus any form of refrigeration), a household goods market, and a clothing market. We also wandered around the few Artesania shops that there are here (no where near as many as the other cities we have been in). Sucre is known for it´s yummy chocs, so of course we had to sample them. We bought 8 chocs for B/8 (NZ$1.25) - and they were sooooo good, but very rich.We wandered around the city a bit more, and late afternoon headed back to to hostal for a rest before dinner. We went to a fab cafe for tea, called Biblio Cafe. I had the yummiest crepes with ice cream and choc sauce for dessert!
Thursday 24 AprilI was keen to do a tour of the silver mines while in Potosi, which was something Michelle was not at all keen on doing - she´s somewhat claustrophopic. After arriving at our hostel at 2:30am I was having a hard time deciding if I could be bothered getting up early enough to do the tour. I did manage to drag myself out of bed in time to have a quick breakfast and dash off to a tour agency, and I was very glad that I did.All of the mine tours are guided by ex-miners. Our guide had spent a reletively short five years in the mines before becoming a guide. Fortunately his English was very good, he gave a great idea overview of the different systems the miners work under, and what they prefer. The conditions are pretty harrowing, we only spent a couple of hours in the mines, and that was more than enough. Upon entering the mine, which has been worked for about 500 years, I was thinking it wasn´t too bad, and that Michelle may have found it ok after all. The first level was reasonably cool, the air wasn´t too dusty and the tunnel was plently big enough. As soon as we started to descend to level two I realised I was wrong, the tunnel descending down was a tight awkward passage, leading to tight, hot tunnels thick with dust. Breathing became difficult through the bandana I´d bought to keep the dust out.The miners used dynamite to blast the ore, shovelled it by hand into trolleys that ran on rails, which they then halled by hand to vertical shafts. They dumped the two tonne loads onto the floor, shovelled into rubber buckets that were winched up the shafts by electric winches. Four miners managed 400 tonnes of ore a day. In the past it took 40 miners to mine 200 tonnes a day without the trolleys and winches, carrying the ore in sacks on their backs. Ironically they see these advances as great progress.One of the guys in another group asked about the fatality rate in the mines - and apparently it´s about 60 mining related deaths per year, about 40 of which are from lung damage due to the dust. He was told that on a per-person basis they have fewer accidents per year than other mining operations throughout the world. I don´t think that´s particularly relevant as so many people are exposed to the risk, especially compared to the rate of ore the extracted - also their accident reporting´s probably not to the same standard as those of operations in developed nations. (Bolivia is consider "third world" by the way). They also don´t employ mining engineers, they have the attitude that they´ve been mining for more than 500 years, so they know what they´re doing better than anyone else!Anyway, to demonstrate their dedication to health and safety we had a bit of a play with dynamite at the end of the mine tour, the guides lit the stuff, ran off to a safe distance, dropped the dynamite and ran back. The fuses took about ten minutes to burn, and their ability to judge the timing well was demonstated by the bit of video I captured - their countdown was accurate to a few seconds.Michelle had a rather frustrating morning trying to sort out bus tickets for us - she spent most of the morning walking around trying to find the bus terminal, hindered in the process by misdirections given by the locals.I will eventually update this post with a couple of video clips if I can, but that probably won´t happen 'til I get back home, which really is that far off...
Tuesday 22nd April
Arrived in Uyuni at 0730. The trip from La Paz wasn´t too bad, I slept pretty well, and even Andrew manager some sleep! The whole point of comino to this one horse town was to go on a 2-day tour of the famous Salar de Uyuni (Salt Flats of Uyuni).
We wandered around the various tour agencies trying to find a 2-day tour, but most don´t do them. We eventually found a couple of private tours and chose to go with Andes SALT Expeditions for US$200. So basically it was just us and our spanish-only speaking guide – Evid for 2 days.
We left Uyuni at 1030 and stopped just out of town at the train cemetry – basically just a whole lot of rusting locomotives that have had anything of value stripped off them, but a cool place to take photos none the less. Then it was off to Colchani, a salt processing village on the edge of the Salar. When the salt is harvested it is still damp, so they dry it out over a fire, and then grind it up, put it in bags and send it all over South America.
About 10 minutes from Colchani is the Salar itself, which is just amazing – white as far as the eye can see. Here there are people harvesting the salt. They mark out a square in the salt and then shovel a tic layer of salt into a pile in the middle where it is left for a few days for as much water as posible to drain out and then it is shovelled onto the back of a truck and taken to Colchani for processing.
The Salar used to be connected to the sea millions of years ago, and then was blocked off by tetonic plate activity. So all the water dried out, leaving all the salt behind in the soil. Each year during the rainy season (Dec – Feb) the whole Salar (2000 sq km) is covered in 20com of water, and this solubilises some of the salt and when the water dries out the salt is left behind on top of the soil.
From there we visited a Salt Hotel, where everything is made out of salt – even the tables and chairs, where we had lunch. Then we travelled to Atulcha where there is another (much nicer) Salt Hotel where we stayed. We also visite dan area call the Galaxias Caves, and Cactus Corales. Again, these areas were under water many millions of years ago, and algae formed beautiful stalagmites and stalagtites in the caves which then fossilised – the colours were pretty cool. There are also cactuses which have had coral grow on them and then fossilise. We also visited a cave where 90 Chullpa (local indigenous people) mummies where found buried and a museum displaying some of the mummies – a bit weird but very interesting.
I made a couple of new friends with a couple of the young boys at the hotel. I gave them colouring pencils and balloons, and they drew me pictures and wanted me to help them practice their maths. We also taught them how to make squealing sounds with the balloons, and how to rub the balloon on your hair to make it stick up – they thought it was pretty cool!
Monday 21st April
As we had planned to go mtbing on Sunday we had arranged our bus ticket to Uyuni for Monday night, so we had a spare day in La Paz. We visited the AeroSur office to try and rearrange our flights so we could come back to La Paz at the weekend to do the mtbing trip, but it was going to cost US$400, so we decided that was a bit too much Money, and the time schedule was really tight – so we were both pretty bummed that we aren´t going to get to do the Death Road L
However, we did finally manage to visit some Museums. We visited the Archaeological Museum which was very interesting and had a good display of pre-Incan ceramics from the islands in Lake Titicaca – which interestingly showed some Asian influence. We also visited the Museum of the Church of San Francisco which was very cool, as we got to see all parts of the church including the choir stalls, and even got to clima the tower to see the view from the roof. We also got to see the cloisters, where there are many religous paintings and some displays of how the monks lived their daily lives (including wine and pisco sour making). We also visited the Museum of Ethnography and Folklore which had an interesting display of textiles from all over the region from various eras. There was also a very cool display of carnaval headresses and costumes, from the last 100 years – they were so elaborate and detailed, quite amazing. Next was a display of headresses and costumes entirely made out of bird feathers. Again, they were very detailed and some of the headresses were HUGE, but I hate to think how many birds were killed to make them all. They also had another good exhibition of ceramics from the different cultures in the region, from ancient history until colonial times.
And of course we had the obligatory coffee and cake at Alexander´s during the day as well.
We met Anna and Dave at Yusseff´s for our Last Supper. It has been so cool to catch up with them, and yet weird too cos we aren´t in NZ. We have spent loads of time with them while we have been here, and they have been fab, taking us lots of cool places and especially knowing the best places to get great food! It was so good to see some familiar faces at this point of our trip, and can´t wait to see them again when they come home.
After dinner we had to go collect our bags from ABH and then match the 9pm bus to Uyuni (10 hrs – oh joy!). We went with a company called Todo Turismo, and they were really good - highly recommended.
Photos:
1) Pottery artifact.
2) A Mummy - burial techniques of the Incan, and pre-Incan cultures resulted in well preserved mummies, and they're quite common in museums throughout South America.
3) A skull - well born people had their skull shape modified by fixing boards to the head from a young age. Such a skull shape was a sign of status.
Sunday 20th April
Anna and Dave were busy with work stuff in the morning, so Andrew and I again tried to visit museums, but were again thwarted cos they were all shut (as they had been open until 0100 that morning). So again, we explored more of the central city, and I visited the Witches Market and the handicrafts market.
We were back at the hostal in the early afternoon when I heard a bit of commotion outside, so went to investigate (thinking it would be another protest), but found that it was actually a religious parade, with a statue of the Virgin in a decorated car at the front, with dancers and a band following behind, followed by the congregation that had just attended a mass at Inglesia San Francisco.
We met Anna and Dave about 4pm and went for coffee and cake (yes, more coffee and cake!), and then went shopping at a supermarket to stock up on food for Uyuni (as we are expecting the food on the Salar to be edible at best).
we went to a very nice café for dinner, not far from Anna and Dave's place, called Café Mediterraneo. Both Andrew and I had the lamb special – which was absolutely fabulous (as was everyone else´s food). We also had some great Argentinian cabernet sauvignon, and a free antipasto platter – if you are ever in La Paz – I world highly recommend this place!
