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04 Nov
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Viña Cousiño Macul and Valparaiso

James / Chile / / 1 Comment

This post is somewhat out of order, but we thought they deserved their own, and Santiago didn’t deserve a fourth just to keep things chronological.

With a break in the weather we make plans to bring Mendoza to us and visit a local vineyard on the outskirts of Santiago. Alex has worked out the buses we need to take and before we know it we are on the driveway of Cousiño Macul vineyard.

We pass a friendly security check and continue along the path, taking note of the chicks and chickens, sheep and lambs along the way.

We check-in at the reception / gift shop and we’re greeted by a very flamboyant and gesticulating gentleman who advises us to wait outside and listen for a bell signalling our tour is ready to begin. We’re given a wine glass each and our first wine of the day is a sweet-ish rosé number which I think has hints of honey and citrus. I give Alex a quick 101 in wine tasting, as if I have much idea what I’m talking about.

Before long the bell dongs right above our heads and we gather into our group. We’ve booked onto a tour with a small cycling section at the beginning, something Alex really wanted to do in Mendoza. We set off into the heart of the vineyard with our small group, mostly made up of Brazilians, the tour is in Spanish and I try my best to keep up with our guide Fabio.

Our first stop is next to a man-made reservoir where we inspect the trees growing grapes for making Pinot Grigio. Fabio informs us we can identify the variety of grapes by looking at the leaves, in this case the leaves have 4 sections, then the fifth where two of them are almost conjoined. The grapes will only grow to a size similar to blueberries and the trees are kept at a height of just over one meter tall for easier picking. The chickens we saw earlier are to help keep the pests and insects under control. There is a complex mix of biology and chemistry to keep a balance of growth for the vines but prevent weeds and other unwanted flora that affect the wine growing process.

The next stop is to inspect the world famous Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon, this time with 5 leaves. We continue our tour of the vineyard with the snowy Andes mountains providing a dramatic back-drop.

After around 30 minutes of bumbling around on the bikes we return to where we began and enter the warehouses. We’re surrounded by dusty giant oak barrels that can hold thousands of litres of wine but are no longer in use. Morbidly, Fabio informs us workers would sometimes fall into these 20ft tall behemoths and drown in a liquid tomb.

To take the edge off, we’re then served our first wine of the tour a 2022 Chardonnay. We’re advised how to properly hold a wine glass for drinking and also for posing for photos/making a speech. We’re told that holding your fingers off the glass stem like the characature of a posh person actually comes from racism, of people not wanting to touch the where their slaves would have touched, so no mimicking the queen!

I’m not usually a huge fan of Chardonnay but the cool temperature and tropical flavours hit just right. We’re also told that a ‘screw top’ wine, like the one we’re drinking, does not mean it’s a bad or cheap wine, it simply needs to be consumed quickly. Screw top wines will last for 5 years and corked wines will last for 10 years after being bottled.

We continue walking through the old warehouse, built in 1876. The cement is curiously made from a mixture of sand, egg white and lime juice! We arrive at a processing machine where they make the only wine still processed on-site. The majority of grapes are shipped off to be processed elsewhere but the oldest, most delicate grapes are used to make a Cabernet/Merlot blend here. Our next wine is a red Carmenere from 2021 with flavours of red fruits.

The next room is a history lesson on the family that founded the vineyard. Founded in 1856 by the Cousiño family, Don Luis Cousiño and Doña Isidora Goyenechea had traveled to Europe to import the first vines for their new land. Isidora Goyenechea’s legacy is the vineyard’s iconic winery, which was designed by French engineers and was completed in 1872. Having a history of mining in the family, Isidora introduced a mine-cart like machine to improve efficiency on the vineyard. This was revolutionary at the time and put her and Chile on the map in the minds of wine makers, as the competing vineyards copied their approach to keep up. After all, it’s one thing to be beaten by a fellow man, but something different entirely to be shown up by a woman! After Don Luis died in 1873 it was Isidora who took over the family business, quite rare for a woman in these times. She went on to introduce Sundays as a day off for workers, again revolutionary for the time. It was viewed as peculiar at the time that she never sought a new husband. Mere days after the passing of Luis the government and other influencers were trying to find her an ideal suitor. However, due to her immense wealth (and therefore power) whilst the country was at war, they let her be. She’s a fascinating person who did so much for the country, definitely worth reading up more on her.

We end the history lesson with another red, this time a Cabernet Sauvignon from 2019. I must admit by this point I’d stopped making many notes but I recall a peppery taste if nothing else. For the last leg of the tour we inspect some unusual equipment used for bottling wine, a combination of tractor motor and toilet cistern, and head below into the ancient cellar.

Candles light up the cold and dark crypt-like tunnels 20 meters below the surface. Here some of the rarest and most prestige wines are kept behind a locked gate even the tour guides don’t have access to. We enter a long hall lined with barrels and are instructed to pose for some rather awkward photos! At the end of the hall are two more locked rooms, they’re filled with dusty old wine bottles left here for dozens of years in respect of the founders they have never been opened. As we take photos and wander around we’re told even Queen Elizabeth has been here! The final wine of the tour is a beautiful mix of Cabernet, Merlot and Shiraz.

We head back to the surface and the warmth of the afternoon sun where we are given a bonus glass to enjoy in the courtyard! Here we reflect on a relaxed and informative tour, it’s been interesting to learn about a specific vineyard and the family history and enjoy some fine wines along the way.

Valparaiso

Over to Alex… We decided to do just a day-trip to Valparaiso. There’s plenty of buses that go there and back all day, so we figured we’d save ourselves the cost of a tour, and self-guide our way. Getting the bus was comparatively easy from our other bus station experiences. There was no made up bus tax, the bus had a set platform, and it arrived and left on time.

The journey is smooth as we leave the sprawling city of Santiago, and hit the sprawling vineyards of Casablanca. The rolling green hills are sprinkled with orange and yellow flowers, many being the same orange poppies my mum has at her own house, it’s a beautiful sight of spring and reminder of home.

As we enter Valparaiso, the mountainsides start getting dotted with buildings jutting out being held up by wooden shelves, walls of corrugated iron, painted in various colours. In terms of organic growth into the mountainside not designed for habitation, it’s not too dissimilar to other Latin American cities. However, the colourful walls and greenery in between makes it seem so much more habitable than the sprawling shanties of say Cusco.

We get into Valparaiso and get a physical map from tourist info. We’ve read that Valparaiso is meant to be pretty dangerous these days, so we’ve stripped back all our belongings and aim to go back to physical map navigating instead of Google Maps navigating. Our first port of call is to walk along the beach. We walk towards the sea, through the bustling, chaotic and scruffy food market of downtown. Except the “sea” is blocked by a giant wall with a rusty ruin of a building behind it. We don’t seem to be able to even get to seeing distance of the sand. And because of this, there isn’t much or many people around. Aware of our obviously tourist appearance, we venture away from this area and go towards a square that apparently has a bust of Queen Elizabeth on it. We’re unable to find this either. However, we do find a beautiful array of architectures styles that make me think of London and how I love the mish-mash of building styles next to one another as they do here.

After giving up on Queeny, we make it to the main square and are back on the tourist track. This city was the main stopping point for ships coming up and through the Strait of Magellan. It was a huge port bringing in vast amounts of money from Europe. We later learnt that communities from England, then Germany, Italy and France come and settle here, which explains the mishmash of European styles.

We head to our first stairwell to climb up a ‘cerro’ and reach one of the known mural areas to take in the street art Valparaiso is known for. As we start towards the path, an older lady tells us the lift is behind us. We respond that we’re going to take the stairs. She tells us that we shouldn’t, it isn’t safe, that that is at least her recommendation, and tells us to do with that information what we may. We both consider the options, let’s not get robbed on our first stairwell, we decide! As anyone who knows us knows, we’re usually the first to choose the more physical option to a route, but we’ll take the easy route up to stay safe. Plus, the lift is only 10p and also part of the right of passage of visiting Valparaiso, so up we go, safely in the lift. There are various funicular in Valparaiso, relics from the era of wealth as one of the eldest is built in the late 19th century, and thankfully still going strong.

Now even more on edge than when we started, we try and find our way to a bar recommendation for a viewpoint cocktail. We walk down some cool little streets, buildings adorned with artwork of different styles and vibrant colours. There’s a beautiful little square at the top with Hotel Brighton and we check out some cute little eateries.

Unfortunately, we find the bar we were looking for, but it doesn’t open until 3, and I’m getting too hungry to wait. So, we head back to a place we’d passed by earlier, Café del Pintor. We enjoy a lovely 3 course meal eating outside enjoying the sunshine and quiet streets. A tour guide instructs her patrons to not put their bags on the chairs next to them, but under their feet. The beautiful streets feel like the ultimate juxtaposition for the danger and fear we’re subconsciously feeling from all angles.

After lunch, we aim to join a free walking tour. James is still feeling a bit off, so we meander down a bit early, get some anti-nausea pills that the NHS only provide on prescription for 90p (!), and wait in the shade. Other tour groups come and go, but ours never arrives. We can’t get a break! We give in and decide to do our own walking tour, to check out the unexplored streets.

As we wander around, up and down some more of the less ‘European’ streets, a lady leans out her window and asks where we’re going. Not another warning away… I reply that we’re just walking, and she says nothing more. I ask if it’s safe, and she says it’s fine. Mmmk then. We’re now in an area with houses that look like something built in the wild west. Wood frames and corrugated iron for walls. Most of these are painted with either murals or just a bright colour. It’s the definition of higgeldy piggeldy, but it looks like none of these structures have been checked into since they were built decades before. We safely make it around the latest loop, and head back to the main touristy section as there are two stairwells I’m keen to find. I’d recommend just Google-ing Valparaiso as, for now obvious reasons, we weren’t getting our phones out at each opportunity.

I make it to play some piano:

before we go for a viewpoint cocktail, enjoying an apple pisco sour, and a classic pisco sour, as we watch over the sea and docks (and seagulls) hard at work.

The last stairwell is a colourful one, and as we drop down I notice a couple taking a photo with a totoro, kindred spirits!

We make our last loop around before deciding to head back as it’s reaching rush-hour. We easily find tickets on a bus heading back, and say goodbye to an interesting experience. The mere presentation of the city makes it all that more inviting, but in reality, the shanty towns these artworks adorn are seemingly no safer than if you were to walk the shanty towns of Cusco or La Paz.

The history here is one of a city full of prosperity and opportunity, that disappeared in the blink of an eye with the Panama canal as ships no longer needed to risk the ridiculously dangerous Strait of Magellan (also check this out, looks ridiculous!). Goodbye wealth, goodbye Europeans, goodbye investment. Of course, goodbye all those that had the means to leave for opportunity elsewhere. Hence a city seemingly stuck in the past, like a faint memory of the lives that once were.

As I understand it, the murals here grew as a form of rebellion and expression after Pinochet (the regime that burnt books and painted over art and expressionism to control the masses). That they are now a seemingly dangerous area is unfortunately a reflection of wider issues Chile is experiencing. It’s hard for us to decide on our lasting impression of the city, as we realise how on edge we were throughout the experience. Which is a huge shame. It’s a gorgeous and fantastic city, and maybe if we’d managed to get on the tour we would have felt more at ease and been able to enjoy it, but for us, we were largely glad to be back in relative safety. We hope the safety issue improves, because it really is a gorgeous place, but we saw no sign of the authorities doing much in the way of keeping people safe, so thanks to the locals who did.

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Adventure – climbing up and down and all around Valparaiso, bimbling about on bikes in the sunshine

Excitement – doing a bike tour around a vineyard, seeing all the cute animals around, learning all about an influential woman in Chile

Trauma – finding out we’d used the metro card wrong and were out of money (whilst youths just pushed through the turnstile in rebellion), being on edge in Valparaiso and not being able to enjoy it, not being able to find the sea/Queen/tour in Valparaiso.

02 Nov
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Santiago – City Life

Alex White / Chile / / 0 Comments

With the forecast looking bleakly British for a few days, glorious some others, we decide to save the glorious days for a wine tour and trip to the seaside city of Valparaiso. The others we’ll spend doing a city tour, trying to find me some warm clothes, going to the cinema, to the Human Rights museum, and picking up some boots Vivo has amazingly shipped out to Chile for me. This post will be largely about our week in the city, with our adventures out saved for separate entries.

I should caveat this post especially that the information shared in any of these posts is based on brief moments of learning, that will clearly be biased from the perspectives of those who share the knowledge we share with you. No doubt there is more information on all sides. These posts hopefully serve as inspiration to learn more, rather than to infer what we say here is the only story to be told.

Our first morning in our new flat for the week is spent with James getting food in, whilst I get planning. There’s a free walking tour this afternoon, and we decide it’ll be a perfect way to get to know the city that I’d been previously told had no tourist attractions.

A Brief History

We find our guide MJ at the Plaza de Armas, a young Colombian woman who rattles off her knowledge of Santiago like the pro she is. We find this really hard to follow at first, despite her favourite question of “got it?”, like a YouTube video spliced together without a pause to even process the last few seconds. We feel old. Thankfully, we either get used to this continuois influx of info, or the amount slows down to more manageable chunks, and we get into the rhythm of learning.

We first learn about the Plaza de Armas that we’re standing in. She points out that you find Plaza de Armas in almost all Spanish cities, that this is a distinctly Spanish thing. You don’t get them in Portuguese settlements, and sure you get main squares in other cultures, but there is something distinctly Spanish about a Plaza de Armas. The history of this one is this is where Pedro de Valdivia decided to found the city of Santiago del Nuevo Extremo.

The city was defined by the Mapocho river to the north, Cañada (an offshoot from the Mapocho), the Andes and Santa Lucia hill to the east (photo below), and another mountain range to the west. The snow tells you which one is the Andes if you ever get turned around.

Of course, Valdivia wasn’t the first one here. The native Mapuche people were already here, living their best lives. Their culture was distinct from the Inca empire, although they existed at the same time. Unlike the Inca empire, the Mapuche don’t have a hierarchical structure running across their towns and villages. MJ tells us that when the Inca empire tried to expand south, the majority died on the way, due to the extreme climate of South Peru and North Chile that we’d just left behind. But some made it through, and when they met the Mapuche, they didn’t believe they had come from the north. For the Mapuche, water equates to life, and they know there is no water above the Mapocho river. Therefore, there can be no life. The surviving empire explorers manage to convince them, and they extend an ‘Inca trail’ to be able to trade and connect. I later find out that the Inca empire did try and take over the Mapuche like they did so many other cultures, but the Mapuche were having none of it and (I think) may be the only culture to withstand an Inca takeover.

So, when the Spaniards arrive to plonk their flag in the ground, this isn’t the Mapuche’s first rodeo. MJ tells us that they pretended to be on board with these new people, but when the weather changed, and the Spaniards had no clue how to survive in the now vastly different climate, the Mapuche did the equivalent of shrugged and walked away. I later find out the Mapuche continue to create problems for the Spaniards, fighting and beating a weakly provisioned and captained Spanish side (there’s no gold down here so Spain only sent their C team). Sadly, the current situation for the Mapuche people mimics so much of other cultures who faced colonialism, and it’s become an incredibly complex subject. Nevertheless, the Mapuche flag flies pride of place next to the Chilean flag on the government building on the square, and we see much support and reference to this culture throughout our time here.

We learn about a huge earthquake that destroyed 70% of the city. That there was a big hotel for diplomats on the main square that was converted to a fire station in honour of a tragedy that killed a bunch of people when a huge fire burnt down a government building. That Congress was moved to Valparaiso to create some distance and avoid corruption. That the animals on the crest of the flag are a condor and a vicuña (a wild, roaming camelid similar to a llama), see top of the building below that used to house Congress:

And that there were two important men in Chilean history called Montt and Varas, and this is why these are prominent names of other cities in Chile:

We move along down to the Presidential Palace, La Moneda, where you’d be hard pressed to not know which country you’re in.

Apparently each flag represents the 14 regions, and there’s a statue for each president they’ve had in office going around the block. MJ is at pains to say she does not want to go too much into the recent political history here as it’s a contentious subject. There’s a lot of posters marking 50 years since Pinochet overthrew the government, and also an array of placards with the photos of victims of police brutality out front from a previous protest. These weren’t murders from Pinochet’s time however, but more recent history. Really sad.

MJ steers us away from the complex and contentious more recent history, to go back to the history of the country. Bernardo O’Higgins liberates the country from Spanish rule and designs the flag. The white represents the Andes, the blue represents the sea, the red represents the Chilean flower and the blood that was spilt in the fight for independence, with the star signifying the union of regions to one country.

We head to santiago’s ‘Wall Street’:

We learn some more random tidbits, like Lapis Lazuli can only be found in Chile and Afghanistan. That 30% of the world’s copper comes from Chile. 53% of the world’s lithium reserves come from Chile, Peru and Bolivia. What’s happening in Chile (and probably across the world) with lithium is a sorry state of affairs that just seems to be a replay of the abuses of the past, but with a different mineral, we’ve learnt nothing.

San Cristobal hill is actually a dormant volcano. And that Chile (and arguably Peru?) is ethnically more homogenous (compared to Brasil and the Caribbean coast of Latin America) because, without the Panama Canal, the Spanish shippers just couldn’t afford or didn’t want to risk shipping slaves around the Magallen strait to get them to the west coast.

We try some peach drink called Mote con Huesillos that looks like the teeth of all the people who drink it at the bottom, but is actually wheat soaked in this peach pit drink. The liquid is fine for me, but the wheat is a weird texture I don’t get on board with.

We end with a highly graffiti’d statue we had come across on our failed first day in Santiago, and MJ explains it was a gift from Germany to say thanks for looking after her refugees after the war. The ‘open secret’ is apparently that those ‘refugees’ were largely nazis, and that they helped to inform the horrendous actions of the Pinochet government (hence the graffiti). I don’t know if the timelines necessary match up with that theory, but I can say that what I later learn about what happened under Pinochet’s rule was horribly reminiscent of what the Nazis did.

And that was the walking tour. As it was Halloween, and not a pumpkin to be found anywhere, James spent the evening making a special, spooky meal, inspired by meals his mum made when growing up. It was a fantastic way to mark the day and bring a bit of levity to a difficult few days.

Unfortunately an undercooked sausage continues to haunt James the next day, and he’s back in bed fighting off his latest internal fight against something foreign. It’s nothing like in La Paz at least, and he orders me to still go ahead with my day (so long as I get him a giant Gatorade and box of crackers first).

Museum of Memory and Human Rights

The plan for the next day was to avoid the crummy weather by hiding out at the Museum of Human Rights. This means me getting to grips with the metro which is amazingly quiet due to the national holiday in place for the day of the dead. The museum is equally quiet as I jump onto an English tour.

It’s a difficult museum to go around, and at one point I feel a bit faint, so there’s a chunk I missed as I regained my composure. The museum was founded specifically to call attention to and acknowledge the human rights abuses of the Pinochet regime, in a bid to make sure it never happens again. It’s a bold statement, and another example of a country owning a part of its terrible history. Not writing it out of the history books and pretending it never happened. Well at least, not anymore.

For those like me who know nothing of this era, I’ll recount what I learnt and can remember, but it’s definitely worth learning more about. As my tour guide says, the important thing here is to provide evidence to counter any claims that this era wasn’t as bad as it is made out, was a necessary evil, or just didn’t happen at all. (Sound familiar?)

I’ve subsequently watched a good Khan Academy video on this time period, so the information here will be a mixture of the two. We begin with the overthrow of Allende, the democratically elected President of the country three years prior. Allende was a leftist, and his presidency was mired by failed economic policy. The USA, in the midst of the Cold War, is none too happy about the growing lefty governments in Latin America, and there will be forever debates over wether the failing policies were due to the USA making Allende’s job impossible to destabilise his presidency, or they were just poor policies on their own. As with a lot of this, we will likely never know.

There are declassified documents from the CIA saying they were finding out the likelihood of a coup to get our man out of power. Whether or not they orchestrated said coup, again, is up for debate, but there’s evidence they were asking the question.

Pinochet and a the other heads of the military divisions stage said coup on September 11th 1973. They bomb the presidential Palace and offer Allende a flight out. You can’t blame the man for not taking up said flight after just being bombed by his own men. One way or another, Allende ends up dead. Some say they saw him kill himself. Others say they were part of the group that shot him. Again, we will never know, but the outcome is the same, there is now military rule.

They round up all the opposition and put them in the National Stadium as a makeshift prison. This is the beginning of an ever worsening situation. The coup, that started with the combined military leaders taking over due to perceived lack of confidence in the Allende leadership, leads to Pinochet taking full power a year later, including over his coup-pals.

The museum shows us the various tactics the Pinochet government used to maintain power over the next 15 years. As I said previously, a lot seems sadly familiar. Having recently finished First They Killed My Father, this also feels sadly reminiscent of the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia too.

One tactic is to instill a bunch of rules, that are indiscriminate, and take rights away from the people. If you are deemed to have broken the rule, the military have the right to do what they want with you. After all, the judicial arm of the government no longer exists, there are no trials or rights. The military has final say. One such rule invoked is banning people being able to meet in groups, this includes sports clubs and neighbourhood watches. Our guide explains this serves two purposes. To not just stop any counter-groups spreading their message, but to break down communities, to isolate people from one another. If you don’t know your neighbour, will you care that they disappeared in the night? Or that they are starving? Will you speak up and help them if you don’t know them to realise they are innocent? Alongside the other rules, this helps to breed distrust of one another, because you don’t want to get caught up with the wrong person and get disappeared for just associating with them.

This tactic of isolation is fascinating, because it shows how a nation of a culture of individualism is actually weaker, than a culture of collectivism, who will empathise and fight and help one another. They’re harder to rule, and so this breaking down of communities is key to making a people easier to control.

The other tactic is to take over the media, rewrite history and the education system. Including burning books and removing all art and expressionism. Any book that they think may be left-leaning gets burnt, going so far as to burn books on Cubism because it looked like Cuba. Murals, posters and walls are painted over. If you happened to have any said material that could be construed as against the current regime, well you were going to experience their other main tactic, torture and murder.

A secret police is set up a la the SS and KGB. Of course, some of the people taken away are part of the opposition, but also included are completely innocent people. They aren’t even interrogated, after all, they have no reason to be there, they are just tortured. There is a whole video of victims here talking of their experiences. Some speak to the torture being less about the physical experience (which also sounded horrendous), but the worst part being the psychological wounds they carry from it. The powerlessness. That the aim was to make them feel inhuman and worthless. If you were lucky, you got to go home. But thousands disappeared. Of course, the tactic here wasn’t just about getting information, but to show the unimpeachable power of the regime, to create fear, to stop even the thought of rising up. There were over 1000 torture centres all across the country, from all the way in the North, down to the furthest south. This wasn’t something for the city, this was everywhere. You couldn’t hide. Here’s a map of each centre:

The international community apparently raise concerns about Pinochet staying in power without being democratically elected. This causes the regime to find a way to make the regime legitimate on the international stage. They do this through a plebiscite, whose result is in his favour, and ignoring the fact there is no official electoral roll to ensure there’s no forged votes. The previous secret police is closed down, and they create a new one, to throw off the beedy eyes of the foreigners.

With control of the narrative through the media, they rewrote history, they dehumanised the people they persecuted, and they fabricated stories of the disappeared. One woman who is taken by the regime is found beaten and dead in a river. The newspaper reads how it was femicide by a lover. The loved ones of the disappeared are told that they must have fled the country of their own accord. Even when you know this isn’t true, how do you argue? There is no law and order. There is threat of the same happening to you. There is no community to trust to support you. You are powerless to counter their lies of your loved one. They also fabricate a plan by the Allende government, a whole book is written and made up to show people the Allende government was not what they said they were. The author later admits this, but defends that it surely did exist, they just never found it, so he made it real.

If this is all starting to feel like a familiar amalgamation of the worst regimes, dystopian novels, and tactics still used to this day, then you’re on the money, and why this museum sees its importance to exist. Whilst Pinochet is in power, and the people live in fear, at the beginning, the economy is going strong and doing extremely well. As with before, there are debates as to whether the reason he did so well was because the USA were backing this horse, or because his policies were actually good. And this, I believe is where things get contentious, because of the three lies that permeate. That either this didn’t happen, that it didn’t happen as badly as it’s said, or that it needed to happen for the good that came from it (an argument I’ve heard in Peru too). The last is the most concerning, as it’s seemingly too easy for those that benefit from crimes against humanity to say it had to be done, or it was necessary. No crime against humanity is worth a good economy. A wall to the lost:

The other really troubling part of the whole story is yet another example of the complete manipulation and indiscriminate fuckery (for want of a better word) of the USA’s Operation Condor, to crush left uprisings around Latin America during the Cold War. America apparently only stopped backing their poison horse Pinochet when the regime’s secret police ends up bombing a target on USA soil with a US citizen in the car. As our guide says, it’s fine for the USA to get involved with the killings and torture of another nation, but when one of their own gets in the crossfire and it’s on their turf, well that’s not on. This is all in declassified documents, it’s not conjecture.

The end to the regime comes from a plebiscite, that was on the cards from the previously forged 1980 plebiscite that said there would be another in 1988. It seemed that by this point, his pals had had enough. Pinochet thought he would win, and didn’t fake the result this time for whatever reason. There’s evidence he was going to overrule the outcome if it didn’t go his way (sound familiar), but his pals don’t support him on this, and neither do the USA. It seems everyone, but him, has had enough, and he loses his almighty power, but remains in a military position for almost 10 years more. He eventually gets charged with crimes against humanity in the 2000s, but after 4 years of no progress, he dies of natural causes, seemingly never facing any consequence for the suffering he ruled over.

After this mentally and physically chilling experience (the museum is freezing!) I take a quick wonder about Barrio Yungay, but it’s freezing, I don’t feel too safe in this ‘seen better days’ district for whatever reason, and head back to check on James.

Another Side to Santiago

The rest of our time in Santiago is spent (not in this order) climbing up San Cristobal hill to take in the sunset, which is stunning. The view here alone is amazing, being able to take in the whole city, and the glorious white-capped Andes to the west. It’s a far cry from the view over Cusco:

We walk in torrential rain to get to a cinema to see Killers of the Flower Moon, our first film since leaving the UK. Collecting my Vivo boots from a colleague of my mum’s, going shopping in the fancy part of town to return and buy new jeans, despair at the lack of jumpers anywhere and giving in to buying a men’s mustard coloured sweater in desperation.

Having spent almost our whole time in Santiago down in Central Santiago that is bohemian, covered in graffiti, often falling into disrepair (not dissimilar to Barranco in Lima), surrounded by edgy rockers, skaters, cool uni students:

Our trip up to the east of Cerro San Cristobal is like a different city:

Black puffers and gilets, blue suits, starched shirts, rich folks with tiny dogs, abound. There are no tattoo’d, edgy uni students here. The streets are free of graffiti. The eateries are wide, clean, ordered. It looks like San Isidro in Lima, as do the people. I’m glad we got to see this side to Santiago, because up to this point, I had genuinely looked at the demographics of the country wondering if there were any older people! That they live such disparate lives I think reflects the disparities of the country at the moment, and the difficulty they are facing politically, between an outspoken and empowered youth movement, and the other side who I believe are more Conservative and look down on the youth playing teenage anarchy. “You haven’t experienced Chile if you didn’t experience a protest” as our guide MJ told us, and she’s not wrong. But it’s a fundamental right I’m glad to see the youth making the most of, after all, remember where this country was less than 50 years ago. The right to protest is something we need to be protecting in the UK, and it worries me which way our own government seems to be going. So keep protesting Chile. Never stop making yourselves heard!

The other key aspect of any city for us is of food. The prevalent memory is just how much more expensive it is compared to London! But of what is Chilean cuisine? I’m told by a Chilean that we have to try a specific item from a specific place, so we do as we’re told. A Luco from Dominó, and we get given what is essentially a frankfurter covered in cheese:

Now I like a hotdog as much as the next person, but the obsession with the hotdog here is amazing, and probably tells you enough about the quality of Chilean food without me saying anymore. There are places that sell about 20 variations of toppings, with 3-6 different types of dogs. It’s a matrix table I could not get my head around. The hotdogs are good, I’ll give them that, but how I miss Peruvian cuisine (and Peruvian prices)! (In their defence, the pastel de choclo and empanadas are also apparently a delicacy, but we tried neither).

Our Last Day

On our last day we finally do the task we set out to do on day one, changing pesos to USD so we can take some over to Argentina and make the most of the “blue dollar rate”. I also manage to donate my ‘old’ Vivo boots to a church. We spend the day eating up our food resulting in a breakfast of porridge and icecream, and lunch consisting of pasta, peas, omelette with green pepper, carrot sticks with cheese, cheese on toast, and crisps. Living the dream. Then pack up and head out for a drink to kill time before spending the night at the airport for our 4am flight.

As we wander about, we hear the familiar call of football on TV again, this time it’s the Copa libertadores final between Argentina’s Boca, and Brasil’s Fluminense, but more importantly, they have beer for £2. The game is a blinder, including a bitch slap and comedic fall to the floor. The owner has clearly been having day of it and ends up slumped in the chair inside snoozing through the gripping extra time:

The game over, we go for a Chinese dinner and learn that beansprouts translate to Dragon’s Tooth. Very different vibe! And then we’re off to the airport to ‘sleep’ and fly the final distance to the snowy end of Chile. Thanks to the help and kindness of strangers (and a Boca fan), we make it there in one piece.

Nothing to See Here

Whilst I’ll never be glad to have not made it to Mendoza, I am glad to have been able to give Santiago another chance. By the end, it was really growing on me. There was just enough order and westernisation to not feel completely out of place, but also just enough vibrancy, latin and indigenous history to feel the energy and liveliness of a Latin American city. Unfortunately, we did get a few warnings of unsafe neighbourhoods, and crime is apparently on the rise here (as in most cities it seems). This, alongside the ridiculous cost of food (and the food really not being great for what you pay for), were really the only main drawbacks of being here. The highlights were the views of snow-capped mountains, glorious green hills in the middle of the city, vineyards of easy access, and cheap public transport, make Santiago now up at the top end of my favourite cities list. So, thank you Santiago, I’m glad I got a second chance to know you.

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Adventure – trying mote con huesillos, getting up Cerro San Cristobal after a long vineyard day, exploring the different areas of Santiago (and being warned off some of them) by bus and metro.

Excitement – being able to take public transport, and for 80p a go, bus or metro combined! Finding out our cheap Airbnb had a pool, gym and laundry, spontaneous purchases of the yummiest chocolate éclairs from the shop under our flat, finding tres leches ice cream.

Trauma – haunted sausages, supermarket prices, being on edge on the metro thanks to many reports of pickpocketing but having no issues ourselves, trying to get coins for the laundry, finding ourselves at odds with other on more than one occasion.

31 Oct
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Mendoz…n’t Happen. The Santiago Surprise

Alex White / Chile / / 2 Comments

Losing my jeans and jumper on the way to Calama airport turns out to be just a practise run for ‘letting go’, but I don’t know that yet. The first thing we notice upon arriving to Santiago airport is how freezing cold it is (of course not helped by my lack of warm layers). We’re not in the desert anymore, that’s for sure. The other is how traffic now follows the rules of the road. In fact, our journey from airport to hostel by taxi in the darkness of night feels distinctly like we’ve landed in Heathrow and are on our way home. The Latin vibe (chaos), and dry, barren lands we’ve spent the last 3 months getting used to, are gone in a flash. I guess that’s the difference with flying. But we had to fly to free up time for Mendoza, and also avoid a gruelling 24 hour bus for the same price as said flights. It seemed a win win.

As we head down to the next hostel, we hear the familiar sound of football on a TV, and realise it’s Manchester United playing in an eatery with many a table free, but also many a table occupied by Chileans, not tourists. We make the decision to get some food in our bellies and watch the game as a bit of a reset from the last few hours. We order something we have no idea what it is, and I still don’t know what James’ was, but under all this sauce is a sliced up chorizo. It was good, and filling, but it was mighty hard to eat, and there was so much mayo I had to give up. Watching a teenager at the next table manage to tuck into his hotdog bun version without spilling a single drop was fascinating.

We got to our hostel, Forrestal, in Santiago in the middle of the night, knackered and ready to crash out to get an early start to get some USD, and replacement clothes, before continuing the journey to Mendoza, Argentina. The receptionist had a plate of freshly cooked (and a bit burnt) pancakes in front of her that smelt amazing, and I said as much. Clearly she could tell we’d had a long day and placed one in front of me with a jar of dulce de leche and a knife, “have one, they’re burnt, it’s fine”. It’s the simple things that make a world of difference, and slathering on a thick layer of sweet, golden, caramel to make a 50/50 ratio hits the spot to lift my spirits.

Unfortunately, the rain has arrived in Santiago that evening, and more unfortunately, our room is next to a patio that the rain funnels into and drips loudly down throughout the night, waking us up with each new downpour. This leads my subconscious to imagine some form of slow, dripping water torture onto my forehead, whilst James’s subconscious imagines a rat tap dancing in clogs. Needless to say, our dreams of a full night’s sleep are dashed, and we awake more tired than we started. But we have a mission, and no time to waste.

So in the morning, off we dash to find an ATM, to withdraw cash, change it to dollars, and hopefully find myself a jumper and jeans on the way. Our first hurdle is all the ATMs near us our Banco de Chile, and charge £8.50 per withdrawal. No thanks. We find an area on Google maps with lots of banks near the money change houses, so we head that way. I should say at this point we don’t have a Chilean sim card, so have to rely on pre-researching anything. There’s no looking stuff up on the fly anymore. But we come across some cheap clothes stores that are open amongst the very shut down rest of the city, and I quickly try on some jeans and find a pair that’ll suffice. Jumpers are nowhere to be found. Despite the cold, wet and grey weather around that is reminiscent of England, the fashion season is sunshine and scantily clad. We press on. Every single shop has its shutters down. You can’t even see what their opening hours are. The malls have their shutters down. There’s nothing and no-one about. After trying a few more blocks, we find a lone cafe that is open, serving… of course, no-one. I ask if anything will open today, just later, or they won’t open at all. “No, it’s Sunday, nothing opens today, you’d have to go to the Costanera Centre [the opposite end of the city] if you want to change money”. Right. With time ticking away, we have to admit defeat and start heading back to pick up our things and head to the bus station.

With maybe 15 minutes to spare, we get back to our hostel and I ask reception to print our bus tickets to Mendoza. It’s a good thing I didn’t do this earlier, because after sending it over to the hostel to print, I see an email from the bus company… “Due to bad weather, there are no services to Mendoza today”. That’s it. Nothing more. Not a signature, logo, anything to suggest what happens next, whether we go tomorrow, whether other buses are going but not ours, if this is even genuine, or a number to call. I panic. Without a sim, we have no way to contact anyone. The receptionist offers me their phone to call the intermediary ticket company, I eventually get through to a lovely woman who speaks quickly telling me what I need to do (Chilean Spanish is next level). But my brain is tired, I have always found it difficult understanding people over the phone anyway, and my panicked, exhausted state means my Spanish is failing me. I cry at the woman on the phone, with the receptionist staring sadly at me, and James trying to find more info online. She calmly tells me it’s okay, to calm myself, and speaks slower now that I just need to speak to the bus company and find out if our tickets have been rescheduled or cancelled, and they’ll sort the rest. I thank her and hang up.

James confirms the internet says the way is closed, for everyone. He’s now tasked with seeing what our situation is with the airbnb we’ve booked for that evening. I email the bus company back to ask what happens next. The reply is as succinct as the first. “No buses until Tuesday at the earliest”. Well shit. We have to be back in Santiago on Friday as we have a flight to Patagonia on Saturday, and the bus ride is 8 hours, one way. We realise that check-out at this hostel is fast approaching and we have nowhere to stay. More panic. The receptionist kindly checks and says we can stay another night, but this place is expensive, and we don’t want another night of water torture or dancing rats, so James gets onto finding us somewhere else to stay. I ask the latest kindly receptionist if this happens often or this is just our dumb luck, and he says this happens all the time. I wonder how many gringos he has had to calm down crying at his desk from having their plans thwarted at the last minute and no damn clue what to do or who to talk to.

First though, we have to pack and get the hell out of our room. Thankfully we didn’t unpack much post pancakes, but it’s not a stressless affair. Out of the room, we have to figure out what we’re going to do. Day plans have been thwarted before, but not a whole leg of the journey, this is new territory for us. Do we stay another night in expensive, grey, cold and wet Santiago? Do we get a bus somewhere else that might be cheaper? Do we fly to Mendoza? James comes to the realisation before me, that if this happens often, crossing the border on Tuesday (at earliest), puts us at significant risk of missing our Patagonia flight if they close the border again when we try and get back. The Patagonia part of our trip is the second most expensive thing we’ve booked, so we can’t miss it. We agree it’s a risk that isn’t worth taking.

This crushes me for reasons that, in hindsight and in comparison to real problems in the world, seem pathetic. But in that moment, I’m totally gutted that Mendoza is now off the cards (for the second time in my backpacking forays). James is great at consoling me as we try to come up with another plan, and I’m so grateful we are two being able to divide and conquer in these situations, compared to having to navigate them solo like I did last time.

My last memory of Santiago was of going to Tourist Information and asking what there was to do here, and them chuckling back, “nothing”. So, add in that the weather sucks, and we’re faced with spending 6 nights in a city as expensive as London, this isn’t doing anything to help me feel any less gutted that we’re not going to be bimbling around Mendoza on a bike getting drunk on red wine in the sun. I call mum and ask if she has any recommendations for where we might stay instead of Santiago, and she tells us there are still vineyards around Santiago and we have options, thanks mum! We try to gather info on the alternatives, but there’s now too much information, too many options that we haven’t been able to research properly, and James rightly points out that any decision we make now won’t be properly thought through. We could end up in a worse situation to just jump on a bus somewhere and potentially find ourselves somewhere more expensive where we can’t afford to do anything anyway. We need time to figure out our plan B properly, and so we decide to book ourselves into another hostel and take the day to figure out what we do next.

On our way to our next hostel, we happen to witness a cycle race and crowds cheering the speeding cyclists on. Completely unaware to what is happening, we find out we’re actually in Santiago during the Panamerican games, and we’d just witnessed one of the races. Maybe it was because we were human tortoises, but I’m not sure I see the appeal of standing around waiting for a cyclist to speed past in less than a second. At least with runners they take a little longer to go past you! But it was a nice surprise to be a part of some history of the city one way or another.

As we head down to the next hostel, we hear the familiar sound of football on a TV, and realise it’s the Manchester derby playing in an eatery with many a table free, but also many a table occupied by Chileans, not tourists. We make the decision to get some food in our bellies and watch the game as a bit of a reset from the last few hours. We order something we have no idea what it is, and I still don’t know what James’ was, but under all this sauce is a sliced up chorizo. It was good, and filling, but it was mighty hard to eat, and there was so much mayo I had to give up. Watching a teenager at the next table manage to tuck into his hotdog bun version without spilling a single drop was fascinating.

Our next hostel (Providencia) is even more amazing that the last, as we settle for our 3rd hostel in as many nights. Our eventual decision is to find a flat in Santiago for cheap that we can do day trips from, saving us money on accommodation and eating out, and saving us spending more nights packing and unpacking if we were to spend sporadic nights here and there outside the city.

So, Santiago it is for the week. James finds us a cheap Airbnb, and the next day we move to our now 4th accommodation in as many days, stock up on food, and make a plan for how to fill the days, and try and make the most of the new situation we find ourselves in. I had felt bad that James wasn’t really getting a proper experience of Chile based on our original plan, so at least that was something. And for me, well, Santiago, you’ve got a second chance… show me what you’re really made of.

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Adventure – trying to find a cashpoint that is accessible and doesn’t charge stupid money for withdrawals, trying to find an ATM on a Sunday that doesn’t charge an arm and a leg

Excitement – pancakes in the middle of the night with dulce de leche, finding out our hostel has a gym and games room, being able to watch Mission Impossible 3 in English and be able to stop being sad for a bit, catching a bit of the Panamerican games

Trauma – all of it

28 Oct
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San Pedro de Atacama 2,400m – the Driest Desert on Earth

Alex White / Chile / / 2 Comments

Our minibus driver from the border of Bolivia was a super friendly older guy. He even briefly stopped on the road for us tourists to catch a glimpse of a desert fox. I appreciated this as it was an animal we hadn’t seen before, and if he hadn’t stopped to point it out, I probably wouldn’t have then either. It was small and greyish, blending with the surroundings perfectly. No wonder the flamingoes set up their nests so far into the lagoons! After that brief bit of excitement, everyone decides to get off at the next stop, leaving just James and I on the minibus. I know our hostel is about 20 mins walk out of town, and at the peak heat of the day, in the middle of the desert, any closer we can get to it will be a bonus for our weary bodies. I ask him where the bus finishes, and he offers to take us the whole way there. Our hero!

We arrive to our next hostel, Rafa’s House, to a guy walking out the door… “James right?” he says knowingly. “Yeah?”. And he’s gone. We walk through behind him and find 3 more guys sitting in the reception office blazing up. Again we get, “James?”. It seems they’ve been expecting us! We never did figure out why the excitement of our arrival. Feeling a bit bad to interrupt their session, one of the guys nevertheless shows us to our room and around the place, which is hippy-chic decorated with upcycled items galore. Our private room with en-suite is a welcome sight as we’re pretty exhausted from the many early mornings, and I’m still not able to eat anything without facing unwelcome consequences.

As is the cute, cuddly and playful Canela (Cinnamon):

The first thing we notice in the room is that everything starts electrocuting us, especially each other! The sheets crackle with static, the blankets more so. This continues on to the extent I see a spark fly as I touch a wooden crate! A quick Google for how to de-static yourself suggests touching two metal items together, just instantly zaps with the first metal item. As far as we could guess, the extreme lack of humidity in the air, alongside synthetic bedding, made the perfect combination for generating static, and James and I were perfect conductors for it. This led to much ‘fun’ for one of us teasing and threatening zaps at any moment, and my trying to find different ways to turn the metal bathroom door handle in an effort to avoid the inevitable zap (including using James’ neck pillow!), but never managing to avoid the hit. If anyone can explain this phenomenon, I would love to know more, (we have now seemingly developed a fear of metal door handles through some form of unintentional aversion therapy).

Anyway, aside from getting electrocuted, the hostel had a great chilled out vibe (maybe inspired by a certain plant of choice) and a good kitchen for us to try and save some money with cooking. But first, we had to find some money! New country = instantly broke. Back to figuring out exchange rates, which ATMs to trust and what’s cheap/expensive relative to the new economy (everything is expensive relative to Bolivia). We also needed to know how much the excursions would be to know how much to withdraw. With much research done at the hostel on wi-fi, we set off on the walk into town to tick things off the list. I’m in love with the green trees behind clay walls after days being in the arid emptiness of Uyuni.

First thing we notice on the walk is that we’re surrounded by deep red rocks on one side, and the amazing volcanic Andean cordillera on the other. What Walter had pointed out to us before as a volcano that can be summited on the Bolivian side (because you’re higher up and therefore there’s less to ascend), we see now why you wouldn’t attempt it on the Chilean side. It’s similar to Misti in Arequipa, as this amazing ever-present backdrop wherever you go.

We’re staying in a ‘newer’ part of town so most of what we walk past is housing. We hop from shadey bit to shadey bit until we make it into town. Town being (pretty much) one main single-track road full of people walking, cycling, hawking, eating ice-creams, or promoting their tour company or restaurant. It’s cute, it’s quaint, it’s dry, it’s hippy-esque, it’s chill, it’s tourist-central, but it doesn’t feel forced like in Cusco. After a bit of a reccy, we figure out how much money we’re going to need, balk and refuse the £8 charge to use one of only 2 cashpoints in town, and are grateful for the only slightly less offensive £5 charge to use the other. Context is everything.

We reward ourselves with a lovely lunch that is our first bit of ‘quality over quantity’ since leaving Lima. James has a chicken caesar salad and pisco sour ‘to start’ (genuinely, pisco sour was on the menu as a starter), with chicken stir fry for main, whilst I brave a salmon with rice for main. It’s the first bit of real food I’ve had for days, and it tastes so good (unfortunately I pay the price almost instantly). Fed, watered, more research done, we go for the best rated tour agency in town (Horizonte), and meet a hilariously bubbly Victoria who books us in for our tours for the next few days. She tells us the agency was started by a couple of Frenchies whose focus is on service, and we can attest to this now that they know what they’re doing. With me back in pain, some food to cook for dinner acquired, and a 1.5 litre bottle of red wine in the bag, we head back to relax and recover.

Day 1 Valle de la Luna

Unlike other locations, the excursions we’re doing here are only half day tours, and the latter half of the day at that, so we get to enjoy our mornings having a leisurely breakfast in between bouts of static shocks. The rest is much needed for me and the stomach cramps finally start getting less and less. Horizonte tours are as organised as expected, and show just how it should be done. We all get thrown into a WhatsApp group giving us the information we need for the day, in 3 languages, what time we can expect to be picked up, our guide’s name Sergio, and his live location to track where he is in relation to us. We’re first up, and Sergio greets us heartily as we jump into a lovely air-conditioned minivan. Sergio is from Santiago, but hates cities, and needs to be able to see the nature around him, so San Pedro is his chosen home. We do the rounds of town picking up everyone else (including another French family with 3 children (HOW?!)) before we make our way out of town to start the tour. Sergio gives us a brief intro to the area and what we’re about to see and do. I like this company! We’re taught how this area was layered with lava from the volcanoes, and water from the sea. They would ebb and flow and layer over each other, creating visible layers of various minerals and types or rocks, such as gypsum (calcium sulphide), clay, and salt (sodium chloride). As the plates moved, these layers were pushed up and out of the ground, Sergio explains, like the edge of a book being pushed into itself, creating these folds and opportunity to see the layers of our earth’s history before us. There’s apparently no way to carbon date the minerals, so scientists estimate the age through the number of these layers. As is a theme now with our photos, they can never capture the scale and beauty of what we’ve been so privileged to experience. The minivans look like micromachines by comparison.

The sand is just the rocks around us blown into dust by the unstoppable wind:

Next up, we’re off to an old salt excavation site (although they called it a mine). The red-brown ground starts to glisten around us, as we notice a thin layer of white starts becoming more prevalent as we walk along. It’s as though someone has dusted the area with icing sugar or snow, with tiny crystallised formations sprouting from the ground.

Sergio explains to us that his happens from the water under the surface mixing with the salt below us. The water rises through the layers to the top, where it evaporates, leaving the salt behind (I’m sure we did something like this for a science experiment at school!). We see the remains of what was the lodging of a family who would extract the salt, but the purity was quite low. As soon as they found the pure stuff to the north in a massive salt flat, their business went south but Sergio reassures us that tourism came along and saved the day… hmm.

Our last stop on the salt stint is to a giant salt rock wall where you can apparently hear the salt cracking if you remain silent. It seems that trying to get 30 tourists (especially 3 children) to literally not move a muscle for a few minutes is impossible as people shuffle their feet in the sand, and take photos with their cameras that make the shutter noise. Nevertheless, we think we hear a few hints of pops and cracks, but my expectations of the cracking of an ice-berg are (unsurprisingly) completely off base. Sergio maintains his friendly and positive demeener, despite the clear ineptitude of his latest group, and leads us to our next stop.

Now, the ‘amphitheater’. Less an amphitheater, more a giant sheer rock-face in a curved shape. Whatever it looks like, it’s an impressive site, before our van picks us up to take us to a viewpoint.

Next up, this viewpoint allows us to see the mountain range that stops any water getting to this region, the Andes that provide stunning backdrops, and a birds eye view of the various rock formations of the area. We’ve seen a lot of rocks and formations and volcanoes, but they always seem ever so slightly different, and no less impressive and fascinating.

As the sun begins to lower around us, it’s time to get into our minibus for our last stop, to have a snack and a cocktail as watch the sun go down. We pull up to another viewpoint, and are told to have a wander as Sergio and crew get things setup. We come back to find an amazing spread with pisco sour (chilean style though… no comment), crisps, crackers, cheese, olives, fruits, nuts, tomatoes, salami… the pick-meal dream! We all descend like vultures and as we chat to another British couple about Patagonia, almost miss the star of the show. We quickly hop over the rocks to watch the sun set beautifully as we clink our (fake) pisco sours as a toast to the wonderful sight and day we’ve had.

We’re then ferried back to town where we head for dinner, a highly rated pizzeria, and I continue to test my will vs stomach as we have a half hawaiian, half Mexican pizza. It hits the spot perfectly and we head back satisfied for (what we hoped would be) and early night.

Unfortunately, the latest guests and hostel worker have other ideas, and have a jolly good night of it until 1:30am. Such is hostel life.

Day 2 Laguna Cejar Tour

After a morning of more zapping, passive-aggressive glares at our hostel-mates, the weirdest meal we’ve probably ever made so far, it’s time for Tour 2. Our guide today is Pedro, a Brazilian who loves metal and misses proper live music. After doing the rounds to collect everyone again, we’re heading south this time to some lagoons. He gives us a much belated tip, to not lick our lips when they are dry, this only makes it worse as the wind and heat evaporates the moisture leaving cracks. Bring on the lip balm! We first have a wander around a deep blue lagoon, with some obligatory flamingoes living their best lives, to enjoy the incredible colour palette we have grown familiar with from the Uyuni side. Unfortunately, today seems to have brought in almost gale-force winds, and there’s little I can hear of poor Pedro trying to tell us things, as the wind quickly whips away whatever is said. It’s also pretty darn cold, not something we were expecting at all. Pedro tells us that this is very unusual for the area, I guess we can’t always be lucky with the weather. Nevertheless, it’s still beautiful, and we enjoy the view, before we walk over to laguna cejar.

Laguna Cejar is a salt lagoon, but unlike the sulphuric or arsenic or other dangerous minerals contained in the lagoons we’ve seen up to now, we can actually get in this one!

The wind makes the idea somewhat less inviting, but we are here and here we must.

We all strip off in the cold, blustering wind, and gingerly tip-toe into the (equally) cold water.

Once the shock of how cold we are inside and out of the water subsides (or does it) we realise our instinctive reaction to tread water is needless. That our feet are floating up behind and in-front of us, almost ducking our heavy heads under the water. We can just stand in the water as it holds us up. Or float without a care. It’s not like anything either of us have ever experienced, as I feel a bit like I’m in space or some kind of statis or weightlessness. It’s amazingly weird.

As the wind continues to whip salt-water waves into our faces, we brave the exit as we wrap our towels around us like capes as the wind and sun quickly dries us off. We quickly realise we now resemble the ground from yesterday, as the water has evaporated leaving a layer of salt all over us. Time for the outdoor showers then! As we turn the taps and wait eagerly for the water from the above, we look up to find nothing, as the wind is blowing so strongly that no sooner does it come out the tap, that it is blown straight away. After a few futile attempts of washing off in the moments the wind died down and the drips turn to a splosh of water, I start getting too cold and we give in and just get dressed. It is only as we stand in the sun hoping to absorb some of its heat before the wind also blows that away that we realise there were sheltered showers on the other side. Literal facepalm.

Jumping back into the relative warmth of the minivan, we’re onto our next stop, the Ojos de Salar. These are two sinkholes in the salar, with the road in between, and the volcanoes in the background. We’re not 100% sure the appeal of this stop, but the rest of the groups are going wild for photos with them. I hide in the minibus, but not before the door almost flies off as I try and clamber in and I can barely close it behind me due to the wind strength! The stops are clearly not lasting as long as usual, as the salt-covered, short and t-shirt clad tourists quickly dart around to get their shots and make it back into the minibus in record time.

We have one last lagoon to see, that contains our evolutionary ancestors. I’ll be honest that at this point I was so cold I have no recollection what Sergio told us, so here’s a sign and photo:

With the sights seen, it’s snack and cocktail time! We know what this means, although we have no idea how they’re going to find somewhere in this vast, flat, nonethingness to shelter us and the precious snacks from the wind. But we’re merely amateurs. Our driver knows where to go. Due to us speeding through the other stops, we have time to go a little bit further afield, and we drive towards an area with some big, fluffy ‘trees’ dotted about. Behind them, are minibuses, all hiding out from the wind to feed their passengers. We find our spot, and the tree turns out to be a giant version of a spikey but floral bush that we’ve seen across the altiplano. Instructed to wander off, but not too far, whilst they get things setup, I welcome the shelter from the wind, and the chance for my body to return to normal temperature at last.

The spread is as good as the night before, as we take it in polite turns to grab what we can before making space for the next person to do the same, and wait for the ‘appropriate’ amount of time before we go ahead again in a bid to not seem like the greedy ganets we are. We chat with Pedro about music as he skips through the USB he’s found of rock hits that aren’t meeting his approval. One way or another, he knows that an empty pisco sour glass is not something the Brits will tolerate, and we get more than our fair share. As the food runs dry, we call it a day, and head back to the warmth and shelter of town.

It’s our last night in San Pedro, so I’ve found us another well-reviewed eatery that we head to. There’s a queue despite how big the place is, but it moves quickly. We get a table and choose chicken with mushroom sauce and chips for James, and chicken a la pobre (with egg, onions and chips) for me. The portions are HUGE, especially after all our snacks from the tour, so we’re very pleased to find out we can package the leftovers up and take them with us for lunch tomorrow. This evening, the party is seemingly not in our hostel, so we actually manage to get a good night sleep (after trying to finish off the 1.5 litre wine and failing), and I don’t wake up in the middle of the night for my usual electric bathroom experience. Sweet sweet sleep.

Day 3 No More Days of Static

Our last day in San Pedro starts chilled as before. A leisurely breakfast and we start to pack up. On the trips into town, we had seen many an ice-cream shop, but I was either too ill or cold to have one. Today would be the day! We did the 40 minute round trip, tasting a variety of odd and interesting flavours, to settle on tiramisu + brownie for James, chocoloco and quinoa de leche for me. James’ choice was the definite winner, but I was determined to try something different and new (thankfully he also gave me half of his so I didn’t completely lose out).

After a stop at the shop to get some veg to go with our leftovers from last night, we headed back to try for the millionth time to upload the photos of the salar to the blog, and kill some time.

Lunch inhaled, bags packed, we make the 20 minute walk to the bus station with all our gear for the last time. It’s a slog in the afternoon heat and sun, but the bus is there when we arrive and we’re off to Calama, the main hub of the area that also has the airport we’ll be flying from. The journey is slow, smooth, and only 2 hours, possibly the shortest bus ride we’ve had since we left the UK. On the way we pass huge fields of solar panels and wind turbines, taking advantage of this incredible climate in the best way.

We scramble to figure out how to get a street taxi, and our on our way to the airport after flagging someone down.

As we’re about 2/3 of the way there, I realise something is missing… our tote bag with my jumper, jeans, and crisps for the road. It’s on the bus we realise, and the bus had already driven off before we even got in the taxi. With no working mobile phones, no way to know where the bus went next, only enough money for 1 more taxi journey to our name, our flight leaving in 2.5 hours, we expunge all other ideas to get my warm clothes back, and accept the loss. It’s frustrating (I hate shopping for jeans), but it’s not stuff we can’t replace. I think of Nina (my colleague) who told me before we left about how her whole big backpack got nicked half way through her own backpacking trip. She survived. I can handle a missing pair of jeans and a jumper! So, we take thanks that there was nothing more valuable in there (we don’t think!), and make a note to ourselves that any side bags we have will only ever contain expendible stuff. It’s a lesson I’m glad we’ve learnt now, to only lose some clothes and crisps.

So, that’s San Pedro de Atacama. I admit, I was less than thrilled about us coming to a desert, but it was on James’ must list and so we made it work, and I’m glad we did. It’s been a great little spot for some touristing, good food, relaxation, something different, a bit more moonscape and staring aghast at the bright moon glowing above, before we head south. As with a lot of these places, there’s a charm here I struggle to put into words, but I’ve really enjoyed our time here, to say goodbye to the altiplano, and the driest place on earth.

************

Adventure – wondrous landscapes, not expecting much from tours and getting more. Making dinner in a kitchen full of Latinos.

Excitement – feeling suspended in water in the laguna cejar, being able to eat again! Finding out there’s a schnitzel place with 101 different toppings in Heidelberg.

Trauma – being too nervous to touch the door, wall, bed, shelf, each other for fear of a zapping. Trying to upload blog photos but the Internet being too inconsistent to get anything up. Getting hurried out of our room by the cleaner despite having another hour to check-our. Being kept awake by inconsiderate hostel owners and guests. Realising my warm clothes are now the property of Frontera bus company.

25 Oct
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Bolivia – A Summary

Alex White / Bolivia / / 2 Comments

Well that’s our stint in Bolivia done! We’ve made it into Chile and the third country on our trip. It feels like we’ve been gone for ages, so it keeps being a reality check to realise we’re still only 7 weeks in, and Peru seems so long ago! All the more reason to look back at Bolivia, wrap it up, and cover anything we’ve missed. The chacana is still a major symbol here (although Max would be disappointed in my imbalanced rule of 3 instead of the Aymaran preference for an even number) so we’re sticking with it for now…

Bolivia Rule of 3 Summary

Highlights (Alex) – Toro Toro National Park (in particular the waterfall, lumpy landscape, and giant rock formations above Cuidad de Itas). Getting an upgrade on our room in Copacabana after 2 nights on buses in a row. The cholet tour and finding out about Aymaran culture

Highlights (James) – Toro Toro National Park (in particular the cavern), Uyuni salt flat itself, amazing Copacabana trout

Lowlights (Alex) – getting some gnarly gastro for 5 days just in time for the sauna-bus, thinking I couldn’t find the cholet tour and not having Internet to contact anyone, getting ripped off for laundry (digging deep for a 3rd!)

Lowlights (James) – severe 24h gastro, trying to go for a run in Sucre, finding out we’d booked the hostel for the wrong date and lost our booking

Takeaways (Alex) – don’t trust the blogs (apart from ours!)… this country is improving things rapidly so what was “hellish” is now standard; the trials and tribulations of lifting a country out of poverty; the shift in acknowledgement, pride and importance of its indigenous heritage is nothing short of inspiring and wonderful

Takeaways (James) – the constant mixture of noises which locals seem completely able to function with (overly loud TVs, shouting wares, dogs, bikes, buses, music…), still a developing country that you can see evolve before your eyes, exceeds expectations

How to Describe Bolivia (Alex) – vast, evolving, unpretentious

How to Describe Bolivia (James) – diverse (culturally and geographically), superstitious, uncut gem

Favourite Views

  • The endless lake (that I kept calling the sea)
  • The bumpy spines of the land pulled apart in Toro Toro National Park
  • The lizard-like skin of the red rocks above the Cuidad de Itas
  • Watching lightning storms roll over the city of Sucre from our flat
  • The vast expanse of the salar de uyuni
  • The many, many lakes and lagoons of varying colours, but still each stunning in their own way
  • The view from lunch over the lagoon of the flamingoes, having their own
  • The bluest of skies, against the glowing white moon, against the brown volcanoes, against the multicoloured lakes

Entertainment

Podcasts: Talk of The Devils, The Upshot, Short History Of…

TV & Film: Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, Lupin, premier league football, Rugby World Cup, music channels playing hits from the 00s and 90s (and us being disturbed how sexualised all the young, female artists were), Henry Sugar, Spirited Away, Grand Tour (Colombia Special)

Books: The Freeze, Second Watch, Sing Backwards and Weep (a stunning and dark read revealing the life of a rock star isn’t as glamorous as it may seem)

The Bits in Between

  • Aymaran culture is important in Bolivia (as per La Paz post), but actually everyone we met outside of La Paz had their roots in Quechuan culture.
  • In Uyuni, one side of the salar is Quechuan, the other Aymaran.
  • Quechua and Aymara are taught as second languages, like English. They have to learn an indigenous language and a foreign language. Everything else is in Spanish.
  • There are different dialects of Quechua, so what Odi taught us in Cusco doesn’t translate entirely to Albi in Torotoro, and same for Albi and Walter in Uyuni!
  • The cholitas in La Paz wear bowler hats. The cholitas in Cochabamba wear straw sunhats.
  • There’s still strong racism here against the campesinos, with people from Santa Cruz still thinking they are better than your average Bolivian (this was the case when I was here before).
  • I forgot that you cross the border and two staples of my diet change name… avocado goes from ‘palta’ to ‘aguacate’, and strawberry goes from ‘fresa’ to ‘frutilla’.
  • Lake Titicaca is shrinking. Rodolfo (from Torotoro) tells us this is largely because of industrial agriculture and mining ciphoning the water sources to their means and cutting off the supply.
  • We’ve seen a huge amount of signs and notices about caring for the environment here, whether it’s about waste or the trees, there are constant reminders to care for your surroundings and pachamama. It’s nice.
  • I think the Western world looks at Latin-America and thinks we’re more stable and got it sorted. Sure, politically it is, we swing nowhere near as far right or left (for now!), but the risk is poor governance here, not the risk of any war or invasion. The Western world, on the other-hand, looks so much more unstable from over here, with invasions, genocide and threats of another world war on the cards. Some political turmoil doesn’t seem so bad by comparison, I think we shouldn’t be throwing stones in our incredibly fragile glass house.
  • Walter tells us that when he was growing up he had to do homework by candlelight, how infrastructure and access to basic utilities have vastly improved with Evo’s investments. However, the next generation take this all for granted, it’s what they’ve always had, and so he tells us they don’t really care for Evo.
  • All that being said, Walter tells us there really isn’t much alternative (sounds familiar).
  • Drug cartels are going to exist, they are going to produce drugs and make money, one way or another. The potential difference with Bolivia, is that ex-president (allegedly) Evo Morales made a deal with the cartels to make a lot of money, which he then used to improve the lives of Bolivia’s people (and took his cut of course). Is this not better than the cartels just taking the money for themselves and the country being ruined by them with nothing to show for it?
  • Evo Morales is vying to be president again. One story is that the reason is because he still owes the cartels money. But you compare this to the presidents of other Latin-American countries (ahem, Peru), who have ciphoned off money from wherever they could (although not so blatantly or if at all from drugs) and just ran off with it… He’s a divisive character for a lot of reasons, but at least Evo gave something back?
  • Triple carbs in acceptable
  • The chaotic traffic is no longer terrifying
  • The catholics tried to convince the locals that their beliefs weren’t dissimilar, that inti was Jesus for example, but the people saw through it and rejected it
  • What did convert them was the fear of losing their souls and the catholics, realising this, they manipulated this to their advantage
  • French people seem wholly capable of travelling with not just one child but multiple, and with the same amount of backpacks!
  • The joy of home-cooked meals and vegetables
  • A smiley face to lost and confused gringos will guarantee a sale
  • Power gym playlists are the same across continents
  • Lifting weights at altitude is way harder than we ever imagined (or we’ve lost all muscle mass)
  • The beautiful gym bunny coming up to me and making conversation leading to her, out of nowhere, pointing out how curvy the women are (humble brag?)
  • Whilst waiting 20mins on the road for James in La Paz, a cholita was selling her plastic bags of drink for 1B, she sold none in the time I was there, and even if she did, how is that an income?
  • Rehydration salt sachets in Bolivia are for babies, and you have to dissolve them in a litre of water. Adults however are to seemingly drink a 5x2x12cm hard, plastic bubble of golden liquid, that looked like it would burst as soon as you cut the corner off it. I chose the baby option
  • We’re both endlessly grateful to be in a time in history and a country that has accessible medicine that makes gastro a horrible inconvenience, but not life-threatening.

Photos from the Cutting Room Floor:

Beautiful flowers that are the colours of the Bolivian flag, that were painted all over the hostel in Copacabana:

Leaving The Freeze to travel onwards with someone else:

One of many signs reminding people to respect Pachamama and care for their surroundings:

Only in La Paz:

Enjoying a bit of ‘normal’ amongst the chaos of La Paz:

Is this what killed James…?

Teaching James how to eat salteñas:

Weird looking ‘fly’ in Toro Toro?

Tapping into memories of school to watch the partial solar eclipse:

Pretty, deadly, bush:

Just pretty:

Gyming in Sucre:

Food market in Sucre:

Killing time:

The rather friendly but playful kitten in our complex in Sucre:

How you move cargo from your 1st floor office down to bus-level for loading… essentially a rope with a hook on the end and you just lower it over the side, woe betide any passenger walking beneath. Includes anything from bikes to bed frames (not our bus or cargo I might add):

And the many many more photos we have from the Uyuni tour:

25 Oct
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Salar de Uyuni: Part Two

James / Bolivia / / 2 Comments

Day 2 – Swimming in the starlight

Breakfast is at 6.30am … no such thing as a lie-in on these tours. Alex gives her stomach a break while I devour the first batch of fresh tasty bread I’ve had in Bolivia, the rest has resembled cardboard. Benedict discovers the joys of dulce leche, basically a caramel spread that is very popular across South America. We pile back into the jeep and as I’m feeling much more refreshed today I ride shotgun next to Walter while Alex has a lie down across the backseats. Ben and Julia kindly ride in the back row to give Alex some space to spread out.

Our first stop is in a small town where local farmers live. On the way we pass one toiling away in the field by the roadside, an elderly man planting quinoa seeds one by one with his hands. In the town, there is a museum where Walter explains the lifecycle of growing quinoa, protecting it from the local wildlife, how to remove the spice and colours from the plant and how modernisation has helped evolve the process. He tells us that even though they are different colours plants, once processed the grain beneath is always white, and the colour is then added back in (although have been unable to verify this).

Next up is a photo opportunity at the railway line that passes through the area going all the way to Antofagasta in Chile. The train only passes through twice per day, once in the early morning and again late at night, so it’s perfectly safe for us to take some pictures! The train line used to be used for transporting minerals and other cargo as well as passengers around the area. Nowadays however this is mostly done using trucks and cars.

As we cruise through the desert we occasionally see a couple of cyclists who have opted to ride a challenging 5 day course across the Salar. We don’t envy their slog through this dusty, rocky, hot and windy environment. The main wildlife here is llamas and vicuñas and we spot many packs of each as we rumble across the plains.

The next viewpoint is where we can see the Volcàn Ollague, a cool 5870m tall. It may look like it has a snow covered peak but it is in fact sulphur. The local shop here sells llama sausages ‘hot dog style’ to daring tourists. Baring in mind how much we usually get for lunch, I pass up on the opportunity.

Our next couple of stops are to see the famous local wildlife, flamingos. There are 3 species here, the Andean, the Chilean and the James flamingo! Seemingly named after the person who discovered them. The pink on their tails is unbelievably vibrant. We learn that the ones without colour are actually the younglings, yet to get the pigment through. It feels as though we are in an episode of Planet Earth and we long for the dulcet tones of David Attenborough to narrate what we are witness to.

We sit on the banks of the lagoon while Walter busies himself preparing our lunch table. We have an incredible view of the surrounding area while we eat pasta, roast chicken, fresh and steamed vegetables, sweet potatoes, normal potatoes and fried banana. I’m glad I skipped the llama sausage!

Driving along after lunch we ask Walter about his personal life. His parents don’t live too far from here and own farmland where they grow quinoa and look after alpacas. Walter grew up there and learned to drive at 14 years old, after that he went to university in Sucre where he also learned English. He does these trips as often as he can to make money and pay off the loan he took out to buy his Toyota. Not all of the drivers own their tour cars but Walter likes it as it gives him flexibility. One day he would love to start his own business, offering motorcycle tours of this area as there seems to be a gap in the market as all other tour companies use jeeps. All the way through this trip he’s looked after us, informed us about the area, joked with us and asked questions about our home countries. Once again we’ve been blessed with a wonderful human as our guide and mentor.

The desert landscape morphs into a Mars-like plateau, we’ve driven for hours today and it’s impressive Walter knows his way around without any maps or road signs in this vast area with little to navigate by.

This afternoon we stop to see Viscacha, rabbit-like creatures populating the rocks and posing for photos.

We also stop at an unusual rock formation Ben appropriately dubs the ‘Stone Henge of Bolivia’, with the bright moon creating an extra layer of beauty to the contrasting colours of the area.

Pig or tree? You decide:

We then need to purchase tickets to the National Park, around £18 each… I’m slightly miffed as we’ve already paid quite a lot for this tour but in the end it is worthwhile. Nearby is the next viewpoint which looks out over the red lagoon, once again populated by flamingos. This is the spot where they lay their eggs, on the white islands in the distance that look a bit like icebergs or glaciers, safely out of reach of the desert foxes.

Our final stop of the day is the geysers. Here hot sulphuric gas rushes out of the ground and there are bubbling pits full of liquid that can reach up to 200 degrees! Due to frequent earthquakes in the area, the geysers can move location roughly every 3 months. We get out of the jeep to take pictures and watch our step, Walter warns us one wrong move and our legs will be “boiled like a chicken”. The gas howls furiously out of small holes in the ground, giant white clouds of steam form in the cold air.

We’re around 4800m up and in the shade it’s quite cold, the evening wind chills us to the bone. We take our pictures and get back in the warm jeep. As we drive to our hostel the sun sets behind us and the sky turns from dark blue to light, to dusty orange to lilac and peach. The pictures do no justice to nature’s masterpiece in the skies.

The hostel once again exceeds our expectations. I had envisioned bunk beds in a shared dorm with very basic facilities. Instead we have a nice spacious room with 5 comfortable beds that Alex and I will share with Ben and Julia. Ok there’s no WiFi but we’re used to that by now.

We’re soon summoned for tea and coffee followed by dinner. Tonight’s meal is vegetable soup followed by spaghetti bolognese with grated cheese and another bottle of red, result. As Alex is still recovering, I ferry supplies to her from the dining room to the bedroom where she is having a lie down.

The excitement isn’t over for the day as we’re invited to try the local hot springs under the twinkling stars and beaming moon. There are two options, a 40 degree pool or a 20 degree pool a bit further away. To no one’s surprise everyone opted for the 40 degree option but there is still plenty of room to find peace under the twinkling stars. I point out the constellations of Scorpio and Sagittarius I’d learned from our jungle experience. I also check my stargazer app and amazingly we can spot the Hubble Telescope blinking through the universe above us.

Day 3 – Onto Planet Chile

After a breakfast of pancakes and dulce leche we are off to see a final few viewpoints on the way to the border with Chile. First up is the Salvador Dali desert. It is called this because it is similar to some landscapes painted by the Spanish painter, although he never knew of the existence of this site. You can’t really see it well here, but at the far end of the photo is a big dune of sand with lumps of rock scattered across it:

Of the volcanoes facing it:

We drive to a spot between the green lagoon and white lagoon. However due to the weather and the time of day the colours are not particularly strong. Still, the backdrop is stunning with views of the Volcàn Licancabur that tops out around 5950 meters tall.

The next time we stop it’s sadly time to say goodbye to Walter, Ben and Julia as they are not crossing into Chile and will instead return to Uyuni. We pay a dubious 15 bolivianos “fee” to customs control and board a minibus full of strangers. We fill out a few forms, throw away some food we don’t want to risk being found by customs and cross the border. Our minibus enters a bizarre industrial building where our passports are stamped and our bags scanned for any contraband.

Before long we’re descending down towards the desert town of San Pedro de Atacama where our next adventure awaits…

****************

Adventure – Discovering so much more to this area than ‘just’ the salt flats, star-gazing from a hot pool

Excitement – Seeing flamingos in the wild for the first time, surprise bottles of red wine, feeling like we were on another planet

Trauma – Alex counting down until the next stomach cramps, James losing a Chasing Lights sock in the hot springs

23 Oct
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Salar de Uyuni: Part One

James / Bolivia / / 1 Comment

Day One – Into the wild blue yonder

We begin our final voyage in the unusual planetscape of Bolivia with the familiarity of a night bus. This time with the bus company Emperador, I’m not sure how emperor’s like to travel but this bus resembles a sauna on wheels. Despite the night air of Sucre being a toasty 27 degrees, the radiators are on full blast all the way to Uyuni. Unbelievably, the local sat in front of me closes the small window, cutting off any chance of fresh cold air for the next 8 hours. To add insult to injury, the local and his family sleep under wool blankets, while Alex and I swelter and sweat throughout the night.

Having barely slept a wink, we arrive in Uyuni bus station at 5am. Collecting our luggage from the steamed up bus, we head to a local cafe to have breakfast and wait for our tour to start. Thanks to Zita who we met in Toro Toro, we’ve prebooked our tour based on her recommendation. From the bus station, we meet a fellow Brit called Lauren who helps lift our mood and chats with us over breakfast. There isn’t much to do in Uyuni town itself so we wander around and buy some supplies for the next few days, while the prices are still cheap in town. By this point, Gatorade is the first item on the shopping list, especially as Alex has an upset tummy from our last day in Sucre.

Around 10.30 there’s a bit of Bolivian chaos but eventually we’re in our group of 4 plus an English speaking guide and driver called Walter. A sweet and humble Bolivian who will guide us through hundreds of kilometers of salt flats and desert over the next three days. Also in our group are Benedict and Julia, a lovely couple from Munich. A short jeep ride from town is our first stop, the train cemetery. Around a dozen dusty locomotive engines and rusting carriages are scattered across the sand. A local wanted to create a train museum here but he sadly passed before fulfilling his dream. Still, the area is crawling with tourists and it’s a mesmerizing sight to behold.

Some unexpected guests visit the cemetery..

Back in the huge Toyota Land Cruiser and we’re off to the salt flats proper. We make a short stop at a local town where some buildings are built with bricks made out of salt! Walter gives us a quick tour of the local salt factory where salt is harvested, dried and cleansed before being packaged and sold within Bolivia. As Bolivia is a land locked country, thanks to Chile stealing its ocean access, this is the only place Bolivia can extract salt. We browse the local merchandise feeling a bit sad we won’t be able to buy many souvenirs on this trip.

Driving further into the Salar we witness the dry, sandy earth slowly start to turn white and almost crystal like. “This is just the beginning” Walter teases as we stop for lunch in a large structure made out of salt next to where the Dakar rally started in 2013. We find our table and chairs are made out of… you guessed it, salt!

Lunch is a large buffet consisting of giant slabs of beef, locally grown quinoa, avocados, tomatoes and steamed veg. Over lunch we get to know Ben and Julia. Though they are both from Munich, Ben currently lives in Amsterdam working for Rivian, an electric car company based in the USA, currently expanding to Europe and the Middle East. Julia lives in Dublin and works for a HR company, they’re planning to both live in Amsterdam some time next year. Alex and I feel blessed to have met such friendly, interesting and fun people in every group we’ve been in so far. Powered by 2L of coke and large chunks of watermelon for desert, we’re reenergized and ready to go.

Walter drives us deeper into the heart of the salt flats and we’re surrounded by large lines of crystals creating hexagonal shapes surface. Contrasted with the bright blue of the sky, it’s once again unlike anything I’ve seen before. We pull up with nothing to see for miles around except the odd volcano breaking the horizon. It’s time for some fun photos and Walter expertly guides us through the best poses and angles.

The penultimate stop of the day is Isla Incahuasi where we’re free to roam and take pictures for around an hour, while Walter waits with the jeep. This island in the middle of the flats is essentially a giant rock populated with hundreds of cacti and a few small birds. Some of the cacti are over 5 meters tall and only grow 1cm per year… so they have been here for quite some time.

Alex is besotted with the local birds and desperately tries to get a good picture of one as they flit around the island. Meanwhile I’m staring up at the bright moon, wondering whether I still want to go up there one day having seen such incredible sights down here on Earth.

Even all the way out here they have electricity and flushing, modern toilets, when you’ve had food poisoning you realize how important these things are that we usually take for granted back home!

We drive another 45 minutes across the crunching salt tiles, I’m fighting to stay awake and take it all in, remembering these vistas are rare and precious, despite how exhausted I am.

The final stop of the day is to watch the sun set and illuminate the sky all colors of the rainbow. Walter surprises us by setting up a table and bringing us snacks, biscuits, muffins and a bottle of Bolivian red wine!

We take some more epic photos and climb back into the warmth of the jeep as the air has taken a sudden chill and the wind whips up around us.

Our hostel for the night is surprisingly modern and clean. Sure it’s basic but we have a private double room with an ensuite bathroom, a hot shower and constant electricity. It may not sound like much but the accomodation would have been much more rudimentary a few years ago, as Alex was witness to on her previous visit here.

Still full from the huge lunch and sunset snacks again it’s time to eat! Dinner is bowls of quinoa soup followed by a giant bowl of pique macho. Despite our best efforts, we barely make a dent in these monster portions and retire to bed ahead of another busy day tomorrow.

22 Oct
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Sucre 2,700m – Sweet Respite

Alex White / Bolivia / / 2 Comments

From my last time backpacking Bolivia, I remembered Sucre (sugar in English, but named after revolutionary leader Antonio José de Sucre) to be a breath of fresh air. Looking at our itinerary a while back, we had decided that we should plan in some down-time, and Sucre seemed the ideal place. There’s not much to do here by way of tourism, it’s not at (extreme) altitude, it’s pretty modern, clean and not as crowded or chaotic as La Paz, Oruro or Potosi, it had some good apartment options, and it was still in Bolivia, so it was relatively cheap. We found a lovely flat just for us to do not very much. They also amazingly offered to let us check in super early at 8am, just after our bus was due to arrive, score.

Except we arrived to the bus terminal 3 hours early, at 4:30am, much to the surprise of most people on the bus. Despite the warnings of the journey between Cochabamba and Sucre to be “hellish”, we found nothing of the sort, perhaps they’ve made improvements along this part of the route too. Nevertheless, arriving anywhere at 4:30am is never a joy. However, it seems the only time a bus terminal isn’t a den of sensory overload of people yelling their destinations and offerings is this early in the morning. Some relative peace, at least, whilst we killed 3 more hours on the hard plastic chairs of Sucre bus station.

Our original arrival time finally met, we walk our way to our new abode, up the steepest incline we’ve ever seen:

Door unlocked, we instantly exploded our backpacks for the first time proper, and spread out over the wonderful 3 bed apartment. What then followed was excitement over the little things you miss when backpacking, such as being able to boil litres of water to put in the fridge and glug it out of a glass, instead of draw through our filter bottles. Also, proper toilet roll. And being able to watch Netflix on a screen larger than our phones! Bliss. Our days here have been full of not much, which is what we needed after 6 weeks on the go. Even the days not full of touristing were those waiting for night buses, which isn’t exactly recuperative, even if you aren’t actually doing anything.

The view from our new abode:

So, our time here has been broken up by:

  • wandering around the city,
  • stocking up on lush fresh fruit and veg from the local market,
  • making real home-cooked meals,
  • drinking copious amounts of lovely fridge-cold water,
  • watching Netflix,
  • reading,
  • sunbathing,
  • washing,
  • sleeping,
  • napping,
  • going for all-you-can-drink-beer for 50Bs,
  • watching football,
  • watching rugby,
  • catching up with family and friends,
  • finding out the cinemas here only do dubbed films (next time!),
  • eating amazing steak and chips,
  • drinking surprisingly good 20Bs (£2-3) wine,
  • feeling safe, at ease, and calm,
  • bickering over nothing,
  • getting over ourselves,
  • doing a lot of planning for the next leg,
  • going to an actual gym and working out,
  • realising we were still at altitude and struggling to lift relatively low weights,
  • dealing with DOMS for the first time in a long time, and
  • watching immense storms roll through.

Upon looking back at my past travel blog to try and clarify a hazy memory, I read a line about how every (non-familial) local I had met across Peru and Bolivia seemed to treat me with disdain and instant dislike. It was a sad reminder, and one I’m glad to overwrite with my more recent interactions, including in Sucre. I don’t know whether it’s because tourism is now much more common-place/welcome, or because my Spanish is much better so I’m more comfortable talking, joking, making fun of myself not remembering a word, or I’m just less on edge having my partner by my side and acting as a barrier to the constant attention I would get when travelling as a lone, blonde, blue-eyed gringa. Maybe a combination of it all… either way I’m really glad my experience is totally different this time, for the better. And it serves as a reminder to me, to keep smiling, keep trying, keep joking, keep not taking myself or my Spanish too seriously, and to appreciate each time we interact with a smiley, friendly local. We can’t win ’em all.

Whilst this post may not serve much interest for those back home, it provides us a lovely memory of a break from the trials of backpacking. To recharge, reset, and re-energize for the next major stint. That involves finishing Bolivia through the Salt Flats, traversing Chile from deserts to snow-capped mountains (by plane thankfully) and Argentina’s hiking galore, money-changing challenges and our longest bus ride by more than double (less thankfully), before we fly up to Colombia.

Let’s go!

16 Oct
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Toro Toro: Part Two – The Lost World

James / Bolivia / / 3 Comments

This blog post is brought to you by Gatorade.

Following a thrilling first day in the National Park we once again headed to the tourist centre just after 7am to find a group. Our aim for today was to do the caverns and ideally the Ciudad de Itas (City of rocks) too as they were close to each other and both half day activities. Immediately we found a chap named Ignacio from our hostel who wanted to do the same activities as us, result. As groups were a maximum of 6 we were halfway there… but the area is quiet, some groups have already formed and others want to do different activities. A group of 4 Brits wants to do the same as us but we’d feel awful abandoning Ignacio so we stay as a 3. Eventually, near 8am a couple of Bolivians turn up and join us, we’re relieved to have a group of 5 as it will save us some serious dollar.

AM: Rockin’ and Rollin’

We stock up on supplies for the day (we’re told the lunch spot is fully booked) so we buy sweets, nuts and of course, Gatorade. Alex and I climb into the back of a large Toyota jeep and off we go. The journey to the city of rocks is around an hour of driving uphill on a bumpy, dusty and rocky road. It is anything but comfortable as Alex and I bounce and roll around sat above the back wheels. Halfway up there is some rest bite as we stop to take in a fantastic view of the sprawling and unusual landscape.

Another half an hour of bumping around like being in a minecart on a bouncy castle and we reach the summit around 3200m above sea level. We pull ourselves together and enter the city of rocks.

Our guide is the same chap as yesterday, a young whippersnapper called Albi. We try to keep pace with him as he navigates up, down and sometimes between giant rocks. There are incredible views of the surrounding vista, unlike anything we have seen before, it feels once again like we are on another planet.

We pass by a set of humongous rocks resembling a tortuga (tortoise) and enter a giant cavern resembling a Gothic cathedral.

Next we find some rock paintings estimated to be 3000 years old and enter another vast cave where locals used to stay for shelter.

Outside the cave, two rather large bulls give us curious looks before passing us by… eventually they come trotting back towards us, giving everyone in the group a slightly raised heart rate. I find a safe hiding spot in a crack between the rocks!

We make our way back to the jeep, convinced that Albi is choosing a more challenging route across the rocks but it keeps it fun. We tumble back down the road to another system of caverns and caves. It feels very Indiana Jones as we cascade down into a giant, silent arena of rocks.

We exit to find a small sandy beach that has formed and Albi advises we can leave our bags here as we’ll return soon. We oblige and continue on to the edge of a cliff where we stop for a while to catch our breath and take in the views. The surface of the rocks is like nothing else up here, and in parts reminiscent of lizard skin. This sparks Alex’s imagination of Godzilla-esque creatures coming alive and roaming the lands.

Back to the jeep once more as we say goodbye to the fascinating city of rocks, that again, no photo can seem to capture fully.

PM: Journey to the centre of the Earth

We descend back down the mountain and pull over where Albi says we’ll stop for lunch as it’s approaching 2pm. Bare in mind we had breakfast before 7am and have been on the go all morning. We trek down a well laid stone path and cross a rickety bridge spanning a bone-dry riverbed. Albi bounces past us without any further instruction so we continue uphill in the fierce afternoon sun. We start to flag and are getting desperate for some shade and sustenance. Finally we catch-up with Albi who is resting at a shelter with a local cholita selling various wares. We refuel with the nuts and sweets we brought with us to keep us going, and enjoy some well deserved rest, both slightly apprehensive of what awaits us in the cavern ahead. Alex is nervous about the abseiling aspect and I’m not sure how I’ll cope with the claustrophobic narrow spaces we’ll inevitably need to crawl through.

Time to face our fears. We dump our day bag into a locker and are given helmets with headlamps attached. We walk a short distance to the entrance, a huge cylindrical porch probably 30m wide and burrowing down into the dark earth. Looking back to take in the last of the natural light before we enable our torches. Down we go…

Using ropes and the occasional metal rung we disappear down into the bowels of the cave system. We reach a small room surrounded by stalagmites and stalactites where Albi instructs us not to touch them as the oil on our skin prevents their growth. Keep in mind it takes a millennia for these to grow 1cm it doesn’t seem like we’ll make much difference but we oblige anyway, at least as much as we can in the tight spaces we find ourselves in. To reach the next section we must clamber around like monkeys on all fours, with little headroom and needing to avoid pools of dirty water that have formed on the floor. A helter skelter down a smooth sloppy rock awaits us on the other side.

Albi tells us a bit more about the cavern, points out a large pile of bat shit (they left as the tourism arrived) and takes great glee in informing us of guides that have heard children’s voices coming from the dark areas of the cave, but there were no school tours registered to have entered that day, ooooo. To toy with our emotions some more we must all turn our lights off and stand in complete darkness for a few moments. Frankly after doing this same exercise in the middle of the jungle at night, this is tame in comparison.

We sink further down and it is time for our first abseil, a 10 second demo and Albi is off down below. The descent is not too far but it is dark and the rocks are slippy. We all do a decent job of getting down with Albi’s guidance.

We pause to inspect some curious looking shapes that have formed in the rocks, see if you can guess what these are called.

Before long it’s time to face my fear as we’re guided through incredibly narrow gaps between the rocks. Crawling and squeezing through like some sort of human spider I see Alex up ahead and it looks like the walls are closing in on her. I wonder how the hell I’ll fit through being broader but somehow my body manages to mould into just the right shape. I’m glad we didn’t have a big lunch.

Luckily this is the narrowest part of our route and after a bit more climbing down we reach the halfway point. Here the sound of moving water surrounds us as it tumbles through the rocks forming a large lake where we stand. The lake is inhabited by tadpoles and small blind fish which we can just about spot.

Time to head back to the surface. I’ve no idea how people had the courage to come down here in the first place to discover this intricate network of narrow passages and hollow rooms, but I’m grateful they did. We take a different route back up and find Albi is as quick below ground as he is on the surface, hopping between sharp and slippy rocks like a mountain goat. We follow the sound of the water back up and I’m mesmerised by the reflections my head torch casts on the mini swirling rock pools. It’s been a challenge down here but another incredible experience we savour as we ascend back.

Before long we realize we’re back at the rope we started at and can make out the late afternoon sun illuminating our exit.

Exhausted, sweaty and starving we arrive back at our homely hostel where Ignacio smartly negotiates for some cold beers. Griselda says she will make us pork chops and potatoes for dinner and we freshen up. We sit down to eat with Ignacio who converses in Spanish with Alex about travel, politics and economies of South America. Dinner is a feast of chops, chorizo sausages, potatoes, salad, veg and bread. We inhale the lot and retire to bed, a thrilling but tiring day has me asleep before 9pm.

I had to get a picture of Cappuccino, one of the gorgeous hostel dogs:

Next stop: Sucre

Transfer day involves a lot of killing time as we will get a night bus from Cochabamba across to Sucre. We relax around the hostel until midday where a collectivo picks us up. We’re sat near the front on a row of 3 and for the first 20 minutes a local couple squeeze onto the row too. Luckily after they are dropped off, for the next couple of hours we can spread out, much to the envy of the rest of the sardines in the back of the vehicle. The return journey is a thousand times smoother than the way out, and we can see how this wonderful area will soon be a must on the tourist trail with this faster and less painful transfer now available.

After a hop across Cochabamba in another collectivo costing around 30 pence we are at the main bus station. With many more hours to kill we settle down in the food hall and share half a chicken with three types of carbs! Between playing phone games, chatting and reading the Kindle, time passes surprisingly quickly and we board our bus for the night. Leaving Cochabamba just after 9pm.

*****************

Adventure – Unique landscapes, being out of our comfort zones underground, lots and lots of trekking while trying to take it all in, collectivo driving through a road still being built

Excitement – Cold beers and a hearty home cooked meal, keeping pace with Albi, seeing daylight emerging out of the cave (we’d survived!)

Trauma – Bouncing jeep, no idea when we’d eat lunch, waiting for photoshoots to finish

14 Oct
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Toro Toro: Part One – Chiflón, Vergel and Area 51 🛸

Alex White / Bolivia / / 0 Comments

Having myself done quite a bit of Bolivia before, and realising we had quite a bit of time to kill before our flights to Patagonia, and Bolivia being the cheapest place to kill said time, James was on the lookout for somewhere for us to explore as new together.

Having read many travel blogs, he came across mention of the Toro Toro National Park, with a small town attached called Torotoro (evidently they got bored adding the space when referring to the town). It seemed fairly off the beaten-track for most gringos, and elusive. The only way to get there was via a 6 hour collectivo from Cochabamba (a city 8 hours east from La Paz), then no way out other than going back the way you come in, and then another 8 hour apparently “hellish” night-bus to Sucre. It was a tough call as we’d so far been ‘spoilt’ by lots of clear guidance and information of what to expect in advance of everything up to this point (except buses, there’s no planning for Bolivian buses!). To go in pretty blind and just hope it would all work out when we arrived was a totally new approach. But we decided to go for it. After all the name looked similar to Totoro so there had to be something in it!

During the wait, a lovely old gentleman called Rodolfo came to chat to us and told us that he was from Torotoro, he had a hotel there himself (unfortunately not the one we were staying in). He’d actually founded the national park, but how tourism is good and bad for the area and country (Peru had learnt the hard-way). At 5:30am after a night-bus there was no doubt a lot more said that my brain did not fully take in, but my lasting impression was of another kind Bolivian we were lucky to cross paths with.

It turned out that whilst the journey used to take 6 hours a few years ago when the blogs we’d read were written, it now takes 3. Hooray! The State is improving the road, so whilst the journey out was incredibly bumpy, tight, dusty and hot, we were hugely happy to arrive in just 3.5 hours (after a few detours to drop off passengers picked up along the way, and having a face-off with the same said construction vehicles improving the road at the same time as it being used).

Our hostel (Como En Casa – Like At Home) was a breath of fresh air from our time in La Paz, and after 12 hours on buses. Not only were there 3 lovely dogs (Kaiser, Cappuccino and Robin), but a lovely sheltered seating area with a goldfish pond and tumbo fruit draping down:

Today was always going to be a rest day after the long journey, and rest we did. The only other thing we did was venture out for some food. I inhaled the best Pique Macho I’ve had (a bit like Lomo Saltado but with chorizo, an egg on top, and no rice) and James, still recovering from his upset stomach, braved chips, cheese and ham in a place styled as though we were in a cave (why will become clear in part 2):

After a bit of a reccy, thinking the tourist office was closed but finding out from another helpful Bolivian we were on the wrong side of it, we bought our National Park ticket. It was confirmed that to get on a tour you just have to show up in the morning and hope to find others to group with and also hope they want to group up with you to split the flat rate costs!

We headed back to the sanctuary, read, played games, napped and relaxed until it was time to eat again. After a bit of confusion (again!) for how the food situation in our hostel worked, we were served up a delicious trout with beetroot (VEGETABLES YAY!), tomato salsa, rice, chips, bread and then a tasty tumbo ice cream in chocolate sauce. The food was amazing and a lot better than anything “Como en mi Casa” (like in my home) at least!

The next day we were up early and ready to go and try and be the sociable extroverts we aren’t, in hopes of grouping up. Failing that, I hoped we could lean on my Spanish and offer to be a translator to win people’s favour (the guides here only speak Spanish). We showed up to the tour office and saw a solo gringa sitting on the steps and so we got chatting about her plan for the day. There were two things James wanted to do here (I was not involved at all in the planning so everything was a surprise for me), and our new best friend also wanted to do one of them, a tour of dinosaur footprints, and a dip in a pool of a waterfall. So we were 3. The vans take 6, so we decided to wait for a bit and hope some others would show up. We were out of luck with finding others, but we were definitely in luck with meeting Zita, who was a lovely Hungarian woman who had lived in the UK for 20 years.

Very much expecting a bit of a bimble along some footprints, seeing some nice views, then a dip in a pool, what came was a huge surprise, but a worthwhile one. Our guide (Albi for us, Albino for his tour guide mates) was young and on a mission to get this done as quickly as possible it seemed.

We got dropped off at the start of our (now known to be) hike to walk amongst the dinosaur footprints of the area and take obligatory hand in footprint photos:

The clarity and chance we got to walk amongst these were brilliant. Albi told us lots of info, which my Spanish brain has long since forgotten. We walked on a little bit more to find ourselves in what looked like a field of rock mushrooms, that you could easily imagine a mini citadel of rock people, borrowers, smurfs, (or as Albi put to us – minions), which of course made us feel like giants in some ridiculous episode of Power Rangers:

We then rapidly marched on to the edge of the canyon…

… then down into the canyon…

… back up out the canyon…

… through a cave in the canyon called El Chiflón (that we thankfully had torches with us by pure luck because Albi scuttled ahead so quick we were left in the literal dark of where to go)…

… walking along the edge of the canyon (above this waterfall is where we came out of the cave, try and spot the path, there isn’t really one!)…

… back out of the canyon by literally clambering up a rock wall that would never be a ‘route’ anywhere but here…

… before making it to the top for the last time to take a breath and enjoy the view…

… before dropping back down into the canyon for the Vergel waterfall part.

We were very grateful for our fitness and strength that we didn’t think we’d need! The views, geography and geology were spectacular and nothing like we’d ever seen. The different layers of rock are so evident, the separation of them and the plates making the canyon and lumps and bumps, it was really fascinating, and our breath was taken away as much by the altitude and trekking as it was this incredible national park. We felt so grateful that Bolivia is protecting this land, and that we got to enjoy it.

The second part of the leg was to drop down into the canyon once more and swim in a natural pool. This part was down some actual stairs (800!), and the end was a fantastic natural wonderland of lush greenery sprouting from the rocks where the water cascaded down. Albi tells us how this area was always known to the locals as the secret garden, and it was easy to see why when surrounded by the giant red rocks. We enjoyed a dip and a paddle in the pool that wasn’t actually as cold as anticipated (the slippery rocks under the surface may have thwarted my usual approach of a slow, managed decent into cold water!):

After a lovely time relaxing in the secret garden (El Vergel), unfortunately it was time to clamber back out of the canyon again. Thankfully we all found this relatively easy and a lot faster than anticipated. This was also aided by a glorious fresh watermelon awaiting us at the top as served by a friendly cholita (where there are tourists, there are cholitas selling sustenance):

A quick walk along the top again and we made it to the final viewpoint, a bridge over the canyon edge to provide some final Insta-worthy photos:

And seemingly that was that, we made it. Or so we thought. We got back in our van and felt very relieved to be driven the final way back. Until we get told just outside town, “time to get out”. Absolute silence and disbelief from the back seat as our minds were already thinking of food and water and beds, struggling to pivot back to more walking. Apparently there are some more footprints. Zita and I mutter to one another that if this takes long we’re happy to call it a day and miss whatever else is in store, we are satisfied. But Albi takes no prisoners and you’d have to catch up with him to tell him that first.

We are shown some more footprints that are just outside town, but only accessible with a guide. These are different to the others, they’re likely from a pterodactyl, and there’s also some that are somehow in relief, because of this Albi calls it Area 51. There are also some big splodgy round ones, likely from a diplodocus, and ones from an ankylosaurus (I forget which ones these are):

And with that, Albi finally walks us back to the main square, where we three sit and get our breath back from a day full of incredible views, sights, and challenges. We all head to a pizza place for a fizzy drink and some brilliant pizzas, then head back to our respective hostels to wash and recover. James and I enjoy another fantastic meal at our hostel, chicken curry today; I drink a Huari beer recommended by Albi whilst James has an Aperol Spritz! Another early night for a (hopefully) easier walk tomorrow through some caverns, let’s see shall we…

*************

Adventure – surprise caves, canyons of all colours, the whole shebang was totally unexpected for me and a hard but worthwhile adventure

Excitement – feeling the warm water cascade onto us from the waterfall, that sweet taste of watermelon when feeling massively dehydrated

Trauma – Worrying about whether we’ll find a group, Albi constantly walking off and us having no idea what the ‘safe’ route over the rocks is, relentless sun with little to no shade, dehydration, so much dehydration