Torotoro National Park

Torotoro is a national park located 138km south of Cochabamba and is mainly know for its dinosaur tracks and caves.  

We learned that Torotoro (and Cochabamba) are not very common tourist destinations, so information on Torotoro tours turned out to be a lot harder to come by...  After lack of response to email inquiries, visiting a few agencies, and struggling to gather decent pricing / information, we decided we would instead buy a local bus ticket and try to visit the area on our own.  That night, we totally lucked out and were contacted back by one of the agencies, Exprintur, about joining up on a 3 day / 2 night tour with a couple from Switzerland - Patrik and Priska.  The price was right, so it was an offer we couldn't refuse!

Day 1:  The Town of Torotoro
Our first day started bright and early with a 4.5 hour car ride to Torotoro (that's right - 4.5 hours to go 138km...).

We arrived in the afternoon and took our time visiting the quiet town of Torotoro and its museum of various fossils and rocks collected over the past 24 years by one of the locals. 

We then wandered just outside of the town where we checked out our first set of fossilized dinosaur tracks.  To our surprise, based on our observation of the tracks, dinosaurs actually seem to be quite a bit smaller than we imagined from our childhood.  
According to our guide, Ivan, Bolivia doesn't have a lot of archaeologist.  He indicated that currently, the park is not being actively studied or excavated - all of the tracks are being discovered by locals, as nature erodes through the layers of sediment and reveals various new sets of tracks.  Ivan also told us that so far, they have only found dinosaur tracks in Torotoro but no bones - this contrasts the Tarija area (in the deep South of Bolivia), where they have only found dinosaur bones but no tracks. Their theory is that the Torotoro area was along the migration path for the dinosaurs. 

Day 2:  Torotoro Canyon and the Turtle Cemetery

On our second day, we set out on a 8km hike to El Vergel in the Torotoro Canyon where we chilled out and enjoyed the scenery.  Along the way, we also saw the biggest dinosaur tracks discovered in the park to-date.

After lunch, we took a walk to the Turtle Cemetery where, to our surprise, there were barely any turtle fossils remaining… From what we could gather from talking to Ivan, they were probably recently removed from the park to be put in a museum because they were extremely brittle (and apparently tourists and locals were taking them as souvenirs….)  Regardless, the scenery and sunset along the way was well worth the walk.  And, on our way back, we passed a local family that was cooking fresh bread outside in their horno (oven) - they were super friendly and agreed to sell us a few pieces to try…. mmmm fresh bread….!

Day 3: Umajalanta Caves

This was by far the highlight of the trip: We put our helmet and set out to explore an really cool cave.  We walked, climbed, roped, crawled, slid, and squiggled our way through the terrains of the Umajalanta cave for a distance of about 2km, and depth of 118meters.  The entire cave is actually 12km long but tourists can't pass the 2km mark as it requires diving under water (with the blind fish) for a fair distance in order to reach the rest of the caverns.

Note to Other Travellers
Originally we where planning on going on our own as Cochabamba agencies were not responsive to email price inquiries.  When we arrived in Cochabamba, we did a last-ditch effort of visiting a few agencies but since there's not a lot of tourists in the Cochabamba area, they could only quote pricing based on 2pax which was WAY outside our budget.  We lucked out that Poala from an agency called Exprintur actually followed up quickly and gave us an offer we could not refuse.  We were super happy with the service that they provided, so here is their information: 

Tour Agency: Exprintur (by the main plaza in Cochabamba)
Agent: Paola Gabriela Quispe (paolacbba@gmail.com)
Guide: Ivan Quipse (excellent guide - very knowledgeable, super helpful & friendly, and speaks excellent English)
Tour: 3d/2n in Torotoro - all inclusive with private transportation for $110/person (based on 4pax)

Cochabamba

Cochabamba is suppose to be known for its culinary experience but if you ask us, it should be known for its market: If you want anything, you can probably find it in La Cancha.

"La Cancha" in English means sports field... and this is how it all started - this area used to have football (soccer) fields where ladies with carts came to sell food and drinks. Over time, the football fields disappeared and were replaced by market stalls. Now La Cancha is massive, with multiple markets spanning several square blocks (including a converted train station), and pouring into the streets in every direction. Each little shop/stall is, on average, about 2-3 meters wide which means that there are probably thousands of stalls!!…. We've been to many markets in our travels and we were both absolutely blown away by the size and variety at this one!

For our day of exploration, we set out to find a small guitar for Jen. After 1.5 hours of asking a lot of directions and walking in circles through the narrow aisles, we finally found what we were looking for!! It was quite the exciting and exhilarating search… along the way we saw stalls selling everything from live chickens, cameras, vegetables, suits, fabric, tools, electronics, bike parts, and of course food... just to name a few. And, we are now proud owners of a small, inexpensive (180 Bolivianos ~= 30usd) guitar to play around / practice on during our travels :).

Overall, we haven't really been blown away by the foods we've tried here so far, EXCEPT that we accidentally stopped in at this Empanada/Saltena shop called Wist'upiku and haven't been able to stop going there since - we just can't get enough of their cheese or chicken empanadas!! Yum!!

3 Days Before Dom Can Remove His Cast!!….Or Not...

When the doctor put the cast on in Peru, he mentioned that the bone would heal in 40 days and then the cast could come off. Today, we visited a clinic to make an appointment for Monday to get the cast off. After a bit of running around, we were told (in Spanish) that Dom does not have the right kind of cast for the type of fracture he has. They recommended that he should see the traumatologist (who, of course, was not there...).

Fortunately, we managed find the private clinic where the traumatologist was located, and paid him for a visit (~ $33usd). He mentioned that with this type of fracture, the cast should stay on for an extra 20 days :( and that keeping the current cast was better than changing it to the other type (which would have immobilized his pinky finger better).

Seeking medical help when you only know a bit of the language is hard, we can't even begin to imagine what it would be like if we did not speak any Spanish!

Anyway, tomorrow we are off to Torotoro national park to explore some caves and see some dinosaur footprints!! :)

Sucre

We stopped in a small colonial town called Sucre in the centre of Bolivia.  From here it's a great place to either do some excursions in the surrounding areas, or chill out in the town and take spanish lessons.  In our case, we decided to just take it easy and mainly visit the town while planning out our next steps.

One of the attractions that we enjoyed was the MUSEF museum where you can see an assortment of masks that the Bolivians use in their various festivals and celebrations.

Oh, and we can't forget to mention the visit to "Para-Ti", a Bolivian chocolate factory.  We weren't able to take pictures in the actual factory but all of the Cacao beans are grown, roasted, and processed (mainly by hand) here in Bolivia.  They have many hand-crafted chocolate truffles/bonbons, plus about 18 different flavours of chocolate bars … which... we may have overindulged in.. just a little… :P

On Sunday, we went to the Tarabuco Market which is located about 1 hour from Sucre.  We enjoyed our time there, but if you've ever visited other markets in South America, your time is probably better spent elsewhere... if you decide to go anyway, make sure you explore the side streets - that's where the action lies - also, try the "Aji De Lisas" street food.. looks a bit sketchy but it was quite good (and we didn't get sick) :).

 

Potosi Mine

Potosi was founded in 1545 after silver was discovered.  Because of that it became one of the richest cities in the Americas until the silver dried up.  During its booming days, 8 million people died extracting and processing the ore. Today, the mine is still active and is open for tourist to visit. 

The conditions are still horrible: the mines are still a bunch of passages of varying heights, and to go from one level to another the opening was so small that we had to crawl through on our bellies.  The temperature in the sections of the mines that we went to also varied between 0 and 40 degrees Celsius!  The youngest miner currently working in this mine is 10 years old and the oldest 68.  Our guide was 12 years old when he started working.  The life expectancy is 55 years old (increased recently from 45), and for at least the first 5 years working in the mines, miners do NOT get any medical coverage.  Yet still, by Bolivian standards, this is a good job as the income is about 4 times the average Bolivian salary.

The mining tours may seem like voyerism, but they actually help the miners - with our tour operator, Koala Tours: http://www.koalabolivia.com, 25% of our tour fee goes toward the miner cooperative to help build a new hospital only for miners .

As for the tour, we started by visiting the miners market where we bought gifts for the miners: water, juice, coca leaves, cigarettes.  We could also have bought dynamite as it is legal for anybody (including tourists) to do so in Bolivia.

From there we went to the processing plant.  Nowadays they use cyanide instead of mercury to extract the silver… uhh.. that seems much safer..?!

Finally, we went on a two hour tour of the actual mine, which is located 4300 meters above sea level.  The mine is still active, and on several occasions, we had to jump or scramble up the wall of the mine to get out of the way of incoming carts.     

The God of Salar de Uyuni

While we were in the Uyuni Salt Flat, we encountered the God of the Salar... which was really nice. To thank us for visiting, he offered us giant Oreos… I can't even begin to tell you how happy Dominic was… they were so goooooooood!!! He also offered us some beer which Jen, so as not to offend him, took a sip of. She liked it so much that she crawled in the bottle and drank it all… the problem was, it also had the side effect of shrinking her to a tiny tiny person! In order to fix the problem, Dominic picked her up and blew her a kiss… so everything return to normal.

Hehe, no.. in reality, the salt flat is so huge and flat that for some reason we lose the sense of perspective so can do these crazy perspective photos. Here are a couple shots from the-making-of:

Uyuni Train Cemetery

The last stop of our tour was the Uyuni Train Cemetery.  The town of Uyuni used to be a railway hub but after all the mines dried up, the trains were left to rust and flounder for future tourists to visit :).  If your tour does not go there it's only a 30 minute walk from Uyuni……and definitely worth the trip!

In the recent years, some trains and train parts have been modified into an old rusty playground (that definitely would not pass the safety standards in Canada!!)….. we were just glad we had our tetanus shots updated before we left :). 

Flamingos in Bolivia?!?! (Laguna Honda)

One of the Salar de Uyuni stops was at Laguna Honda, a shallow lagoon at a base of a mountain. Jen was shocked to find out that there are actually a lot of flamingos in Bolivia (always assumed they were from hot places like Mexico/Africa), and that many of them even stay around during the winter when the lagoons are half frozen by morning. They were a lot of fun to watch and listen to - they squawk quite a bit as they're eating :). The best thing about this lagoon was that the flamingos are super friendly and not at all shy!


Oddly, we saw a sign indicating that flamingos are not allowed to fly at this lagoon... That being said, we managed to catch several incidents of illegal flamingo-flying on film.. guess they don't enforce the rule very strictly in the winter.. or it's like the random stranger in La Paz told us at the Gran Poder "...you're in Bolivia now, you can do whatever you want - no one can tell you what you can or can't do here!"


Also, you are apparently not allowed to pee at the lagoon (standing up or squatting).

Salar de Uyuni Tour

If you go to Bolivia, you need to visit the Salar de Uyuni - a 10,582 square km salt-flat desert made entirely of salt. Most tours to the Salar start from the North in a city called Uyuni, but after doing some research we decided to take the road-less-travelled and start from the Southern city of Tupiza. Doing the trip in reverse allowed us to keep the best day for last. Our 4x4 trip crossed 1000km over 4 days and 3 nights, through some of the most beautiful and memorable landscapes of Bolivia.

Since we were here in winter, the temperatures were pretty cold. At night, we were sleeping in hostels with no heat or insulation and the temperature was between -8 an -14 Celsius!! :(

Ok, actually that wasn't Jen's breath…..it's the offshoot from one of the geysers that we saw at 5000m altitude... But the ice on the lagoons were definitely real!! :)

Regardless of the cold, we were able to warm ourselves back up by enjoying some time in the natural hot springs.

Since we did the trip in reverse, we left the best part for last: the Salar De Uyuni! This desert is the biggest of its kind - it covers a 10,582 square kilometre area and is about 20 meters deep.

While passing through the salt desert, we also stopped by the Isla de Pescado where you can admire enormous cacti that grow at a rate of about 1 millimetre per year…. and let me tell, you their size would even put some God(s) to shame! ;)

Another advantage of doing the tour in reverse was that we had the opportunity to see the sunrise over the Salar de Uyuni.

After the salt desert we visited a small village near the Salar where they explained the salt extraction process. Since the salt desert is protected by the government, salt extraction can only be done by locals and it must all be done by hand…ichhhh! They also told us that 50 kilos of salt is sold for a meagre 14 Bolivianos (~$2 CAD)!!

Our tour then ended in Uyuni, but a couple more posts on the Salar are still to come your way soon…!!! :)

Tupiza

After a cold 8 hour night-bus ride from Tarija, we ended up in a town called Tupiza (a small city south of the Salar de Uyuni) where we purchased our 4-day/3-night Salar tour (with Tupiza Tours).

We also spent a day in Tupiza and opted to do a 5 hour hike just outside the town which brought us to some very impressive rock formations (Puerta Del Diablo, Valle De Los Machos, El Cañon Del Inca), and made us feel like we were walking through an old Western movie.  The most challenging part of the hike was not the walking… it was finding the trail and finding our way back to the town. Since clearly marked street names are still a fairly unknown luxury to the smaller towns of Bolivia, it took us about 45 minutes to find the right street in Tupiza where we could actually exit the town and find the start the "trail".  And on the way back, we got a bit lost amongst all of the tire and horse tracks and ended up trespassing on a military base… oops… the Bolivian army did not seem to enjoy our company so much, but were nice enough to gently escort us off the base and point us back to town :).