May 27, 2005
The best advertising is word-of-mouth. Not only does this axiom apply to all things business, it helps travelers tremendously. Standard conversation between two strangers with a backpack involves a predictable exchange: Where are you from? How long are you here? Where have you been? How was it? How much did it cost? Once this important information is laid out, everyone benefits, and decisions can be properly evaluated.
Through five weeks of exploring Brazil and Argentina, Michiyo and I had talked to countless folks who had been to Chile, and few could tell us of their unforgettable time there. Not that Chile is a bad place, it just seemed that with the exception of Patagonia’s National Parks, which were too south for our compact trip, Chile was not that memorable. So we took the liberty of readjusting our self-made itinerary and cut out Chile all together. We headed north for a week in Bolivia before settling into Peru for the final 14 days.
Bolivia might be the world’s highest country, proportionately, dominated by the Andes Mountains and spread over an area the size of New York and Texas combined, but to home to a mere 8 million people. We stepped off a train in Uyuni not quite ready for a 3-day trip through the mountains. To get ready, we had to follow two important steps: take a day to adjust to the altitude, and buy a bunch of warm clothes. At nearly 3 miles above sea level, the air of Bolivia is extremely thin and extremely cold at night. During the day, however, the desert sun allows you to appreciate the scenery in shorts and T-shirt, so you are constantly changing, adding, and subtracting layers.
We set off in a jeep with our two new Australian friends, Shane and Shayley, and first hit Uyuni’s salt lake. Imagine Lake Michigan evaporating over the next 2,000 or so years, allowing bikers and drivers to cruise over the remaining long, white, smooth, salt surface. This image describes where we drove for several hours, observing indigenous Bolivian salt farmers, stopping for fun perspective photos against the white background, and having lunch on Fish Island, a giant formation of coral with hundreds of gigantic cacti. One cactus stood next to a sign stating its height, 12.3 meters, and its age: at one centimeter of growth per year, this cactus was 1,203 years old!
The second day brought several lagoons that reflected blue, red, and green depending on their surroundings. At Lake Colorado, several hundred flamingoes cavorted in the cold air, and occasionally erupted majestically into flight, the entire group transferring from one side of the lake to the other, like a scene from National Geographic. We spent eight or nine hours of the third day bumping slowly over the rocky roads of the high plain between the mountains, but that morning’s sights kept us floating smoothly all the way back to town. Awaken at 5 a.m., the driver, Franz, insisted we see the sunrise. Shivering and bleary-eyed, we came upon a cloudy, noisy field of volcanic geysers. The perpetual buzz of sulfur eruptions created a reverse waterfall effect, and the bubbling cauldrons of gray goo that formed the steam made me feel like I was on the set of a big special effects movie. The sun, peeking over the horizon and steadily climbing, gave the rising steam an eerie glow, and I half expected a second sun to rise nearby and Luke Skywalker to emerge and say, “Welcome to Tattoine!”
The best advertising is word-of-mouth. Not only does this axiom apply to all things business, it helps travelers tremendously. Standard conversation between two strangers with a backpack involves a predictable exchange: Where are you from? How long are you here? Where have you been? How was it? How much did it cost? Once this important information is laid out, everyone benefits, and decisions can be properly evaluated.
Through five weeks of exploring Brazil and Argentina, Michiyo and I had talked to countless folks who had been to Chile, and few could tell us of their unforgettable time there. Not that Chile is a bad place, it just seemed that with the exception of Patagonia’s National Parks, which were too south for our compact trip, Chile was not that memorable. So we took the liberty of readjusting our self-made itinerary and cut out Chile all together. We headed north for a week in Bolivia before settling into Peru for the final 14 days.
Bolivia might be the world’s highest country, proportionately, dominated by the Andes Mountains and spread over an area the size of New York and Texas combined, but to home to a mere 8 million people. We stepped off a train in Uyuni not quite ready for a 3-day trip through the mountains. To get ready, we had to follow two important steps: take a day to adjust to the altitude, and buy a bunch of warm clothes. At nearly 3 miles above sea level, the air of Bolivia is extremely thin and extremely cold at night. During the day, however, the desert sun allows you to appreciate the scenery in shorts and T-shirt, so you are constantly changing, adding, and subtracting layers.
We set off in a jeep with our two new Australian friends, Shane and Shayley, and first hit Uyuni’s salt lake. Imagine Lake Michigan evaporating over the next 2,000 or so years, allowing bikers and drivers to cruise over the remaining long, white, smooth, salt surface. This image describes where we drove for several hours, observing indigenous Bolivian salt farmers, stopping for fun perspective photos against the white background, and having lunch on Fish Island, a giant formation of coral with hundreds of gigantic cacti. One cactus stood next to a sign stating its height, 12.3 meters, and its age: at one centimeter of growth per year, this cactus was 1,203 years old!
The second day brought several lagoons that reflected blue, red, and green depending on their surroundings. At Lake Colorado, several hundred flamingoes cavorted in the cold air, and occasionally erupted majestically into flight, the entire group transferring from one side of the lake to the other, like a scene from National Geographic. We spent eight or nine hours of the third day bumping slowly over the rocky roads of the high plain between the mountains, but that morning’s sights kept us floating smoothly all the way back to town. Awaken at 5 a.m., the driver, Franz, insisted we see the sunrise. Shivering and bleary-eyed, we came upon a cloudy, noisy field of volcanic geysers. The perpetual buzz of sulfur eruptions created a reverse waterfall effect, and the bubbling cauldrons of gray goo that formed the steam made me feel like I was on the set of a big special effects movie. The sun, peeking over the horizon and steadily climbing, gave the rising steam an eerie glow, and I half expected a second sun to rise nearby and Luke Skywalker to emerge and say, “Welcome to Tattoine!”
The last stop, a train cemetery just outside the town, allows visitors to jump on and through several rusty skeletons of locomotives and their freight. For me, it was one big jungle gym, and I strongly feel that all towns should have a train cemetery. Despite spending only two actual days in the town of Uyuni, we managed to eat three meals at the same restaurant. At Minuteman Pizza, Chris Sarage, from Massachusetts, and Suzzy, his Bolivian wife, have created a figurative oasis in the desert for Westerners. His restaurant, unlike so many Bolivian establishments, is spacious, clean, and best of all, warm, due to the huge pizza oven in the back. Not one person leaves without thanking Chris for the unique and delicious pizza, pasta, or pancakes they enjoyed, and I told everyone I met to make sure they stopped in for at least one meal.
From Uyuni, we endured another overnight bus trip to La Paz, Bolivia’s capital. Despite holding only 1.5 million people, La Paz featured a thousand different things happening in a thousand different places. Downtown La Paz rests at the foot of a valley, surrounded on all sides by steep mountains, though not too scenic, as EVERY INCH of observable ground is covered with apartments. Two different population infusions in the last 60 years, both due to economic difficulties, drove people from county to city, and the land, both valuable and scarce, produced a geographical class system: the rich reside at the bottom, and the poor get the view and the cold at the top. Bolivia fortunately possesses the second most natural gas in South America, but unfortunately does not control hardly any of it. Big corporations from rich countries like America and Italy have significant control of all the gas, the profits, and the government, resulting in a dirt-poor population. All of the impossibly steep city streets are lined with small stalls and shops of some kind that provide their Bolivian owner with a meager existence. They sell everything—and I mean everything. From super glue to toilets, doorknobs to cameras, fruit to batteries, everything is for sale, and the sellers’ shouts mingle with the taxis’ horns as well as the buses’ belches to form a perpetual din of craziness that both draws you to the chaos and scares you away. The altitude contributes to the assault on your senses, as walking one or two blocks means ascending or descending rapidly; in La Paz, you could lose your breath trying to think too fast.
While Michiyo and I have experienced every moment as a pair so far, one Saturday in La Paz, she stayed in the city to go shopping while I joined a day-long adventure: a bike ride down the “Death Road, the World’s Most Dangerous Road.”
From Uyuni, we endured another overnight bus trip to La Paz, Bolivia’s capital. Despite holding only 1.5 million people, La Paz featured a thousand different things happening in a thousand different places. Downtown La Paz rests at the foot of a valley, surrounded on all sides by steep mountains, though not too scenic, as EVERY INCH of observable ground is covered with apartments. Two different population infusions in the last 60 years, both due to economic difficulties, drove people from county to city, and the land, both valuable and scarce, produced a geographical class system: the rich reside at the bottom, and the poor get the view and the cold at the top. Bolivia fortunately possesses the second most natural gas in South America, but unfortunately does not control hardly any of it. Big corporations from rich countries like America and Italy have significant control of all the gas, the profits, and the government, resulting in a dirt-poor population. All of the impossibly steep city streets are lined with small stalls and shops of some kind that provide their Bolivian owner with a meager existence. They sell everything—and I mean everything. From super glue to toilets, doorknobs to cameras, fruit to batteries, everything is for sale, and the sellers’ shouts mingle with the taxis’ horns as well as the buses’ belches to form a perpetual din of craziness that both draws you to the chaos and scares you away. The altitude contributes to the assault on your senses, as walking one or two blocks means ascending or descending rapidly; in La Paz, you could lose your breath trying to think too fast.
While Michiyo and I have experienced every moment as a pair so far, one Saturday in La Paz, she stayed in the city to go shopping while I joined a day-long adventure: a bike ride down the “Death Road, the World’s Most Dangerous Road.”
A two-hour van ride straight up one mountain took a group of us to an elevation of 4,700 meters (over 14,000 feet), where we began a 5-hour bicycle descent down a road that could generously be described as thin. From La Cumbre, near La Paz, down to Coroico, at a mere 1,750 meters (about 5,000 feet), a small ledge juts from the side of several mountains, snaking through green valleys that plummet to a river that at times is invisible from the road and takes you down about two miles in elevation. While definitively one-lane, the gravel path sports several corners and slight extensions that allow for cars, trucks, and endangered bikers to sit while an oversized dump truck thunders past in the opposite direction.
The edges of the road give way to steep immediate and dizzying drop-offs, some as high as 800 meters (half a mile), and are accentuated by a lack of railings. Several handcrafted memorials along the way mark the spots of misfortune where unlucky drivers and bikers fell off the side and never got up. As for the bike ride, I had a blast. Timid at first, I quickly got comfortable and kept up with our speedy guide, an 18-year-old former BMXer named Ben, for most of the afternoon. About 9 p.m., Michiyo and I exchanged tales of our day, and planned for the last two weeks in the final country, Peru.
As a bit of a P.S. to our time in Bolivia, we learned that strikes and roadblocks often happen as a result of the national economics of natural gas. We witnessed one demonstration that shut down the streets of downtown, and from what CNN is reporting; the unrest is continuing to escalate. Looks like we got out just in time. . .
One honeymoon country to go,
Joe
As a bit of a P.S. to our time in Bolivia, we learned that strikes and roadblocks often happen as a result of the national economics of natural gas. We witnessed one demonstration that shut down the streets of downtown, and from what CNN is reporting; the unrest is continuing to escalate. Looks like we got out just in time. . .
One honeymoon country to go,
Joe
2 comments:
Hey Cris I have my own site and Im regularly on Pete Townshends blog "The boy who heard music" check mine out I posted my music on it too.
Your cousin Michael
www.shepppie@blogspot.com
Sorry Joe I thought this was my cousin Chris' site. That is him though I remember him working in a pizza shop in Northhampton mass....michael :0 please visit my site and also Rachel Fullers blogsite too.
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