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Journey of Madness // Viaje de Locura
6 days in Bolivia
As I mentioned in my previous blog I organised a 6 days trip to Bolivia in Salta. I chose a private transfer service to get to the Bolivian city Tupiza in the southwest of the country in the province of Potosí because for me it appeared too dangerous to go alone using the bus or train. Just seconds after crossing the border from Argentina to Bolivia I noticed a huge difference in the look of the people and the general "feeling".
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A few facts about Bolivia (using Wikipedia):
Prior to European colonization, the Andean region of Bolivia was a part of the Inca Empire - the largest state in Pre-Columbian America. The Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 16th century. During most of the Spanish colonial period, this territory was called Upper Peru and was under the administration of the Viceroyalty of Peru, which included most of Spain's South American colonies. After declaring independence in 1809, 16 years of war followed before the establishment of the Republic, named for Simón Bolívar, on 6 August 1825. Bolivia has struggled through periods of political instability, dictatorships and economic woes.
The Bolivian population, estimated at 10 million, is multiethnic, including Amerindians, Mestizos, Europeans, and Africans. The main language spoken is Spanish, although the Aymara and Quechua languages are also common and all three, as well as 34 other indigenous languages, are official. The large number of different cultures within Bolivia has contributed greatly to a wide diversity in fields such as art, cuisine, literature, and music.
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I felt this diversity throughout my whole trip.
The following days I, 3 English people, our driver and his sister, our cook, spent 6-9 hours per day in a Jeep, shaken about bumpy streets of soil, rock, ice, water, grass, llama excrement, salt and borax (sodium borate).
What I saw is difficult to describe, and it's not possible for me to upload now more than one picture (but I will upload more after my comeback to Austria).
Just a few highlights:
- Bolivians
- a tomato-soup-red lake
- an arsenic filled green lake
- hundreds and hundreds of flamingoes
- thousands of llamas, alpakas and vicuñas
- absolutely crazy rock formations
- volcanoes
- fumaroles (= geysires with no water but gas) at 5000 m.a.s.l.
- tons of borax (sodium borate)
- a sulphur and borax lake
- the biggest salt plain of the world
- a night in a hostel made of salt
INCREDIBLE :D
On the way back to Argentina I had to wait four hours in the night for my bus in a city right at the borders to Bolivia (yeah, well done, travel agency :P )
However those hours turned out to be one of the funniest of my whole trip: one Spanish and one German guy "found" me sitting on the dirty floor of this totally horrible terminal and we spent 4 hours full of talking, laughing, singing, dancing and shivering in the cold :D ...until I had to get on my bus. Those guys, however, planned to sleep in the terminal. I hope they did fine...
On the way back to Argentina I had to wait four hours in the night for my bus in a city right at the borders to Bolivia (yeah, well done, travel agency :P )
However those hours turned out to be one of the funniest of my whole trip: one Spanish and one German guy "found" me sitting on the dirty floor of this totally horrible terminal and we spent 4 hours full of talking, laughing, singing, dancing and shivering in the cold :D ...until I had to get on my bus. Those guys, however, planned to sleep in the terminal. I hope they did fine...
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