Salt Flats, Dancers and Troglodytes

We left San Cristobal in cloud of dust on Thursday 21^st March and drove a mere 100 km north to the town of Uyuni.

Now Uyuni has been given a fairly bad press in the Rough Guide, it talks about it being scruffy and with little to recommend it, but this was not what we found.  We found a vibrant bustling sort of place, bands playing loudly and enthusiastically, and markets all over with a lot of people in traditional dress.

Municipal band at Uyuni

Country woman at her market stall

Country woman at market

Country woman with sickles

In its heyday Uyuni was the main gateway to the outside world as it was at the junction of the railways that enter Bolivia from both Chile and Argentina.  There are several very large old locomotives housed in the town’s Museo Ferrocarril and, on the edge of town is the Train Cemetery. Here we found a graveyard of rusting steam engines, passenger carriages and freight wagons, a rather sad monument to the golden age of steam. It still appears to have its uses though, mainly for graffiti artists, the local bird population as handy nest sites and the local tourists as handy places to pose. (Incidentally, one tourist lost his footing about three weeks ago, fell off the top of one of the engines and broke his neck and killed himself).

Old Engines in the museum

Old engine in the museum

Train Cemetery

Final resting place

This train ain't going anywhere

Nor is this one

Our main reason for staying at Uyuni, however, was to visit the nearby Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt lake. We were advised to travel very slowly across the salt and in convoy with the multitude of tourist vans that would be doing the same thing because if you get off the safe route your vehicle is very likely to get very stuck.

We had a little squabble about whether we should or should not go a bit off piste (no prizes for guessing who wanted to go off-piste) but we stayed on piste and went as far as a semi derelict hotel built of salt right out on the Salar.  The dazzling salt surface was so intensely white that it looked more like snow or ice, and it was an experience we both enjoyed immensely.

On the salt flat with model sized Lucy

Miles and miles of salt

Big show off on the salt flat

Our lovely hotel was immediately next to the army barracks which was unusually situated in the centre of town.  Throughout our stay (sometimes at six in the morning) we were frequently disturbed by the sound of the army marching around the town, led by its extremely loud oompah band.  When we enquired whether they did this every day, having nothing better to do, we were told that it was the anniversary of having lost the War of the Pacific with Chile.  One wonders how long the celebrations would have gone on if they had won the war!

Children's demonstration against loss of Bolivia's coastline

Protest poster carried by uncomprehending child

Having visited the largest salt lake in the world, on Sunday 24^th March we left Uyuni and drove to Potosi, the highest city in the world, over 4,000 metres high, very steep and with lots of interesting colonial buildings.

The drive over the Altiplano was brilliant, lots of different geography to look at, twisted and turned strata walls sticking out of the native rock, vast green valleys and huge herds of llama, also cattle and some sheep and higher up the constant presence of small herds of vicuna dancing along through the rocks and vegetation.

Vicuna drinking at water hole, Altiplano

Llama on the Altiplano

Donkeys on the Altiplano

There was a lot of oompahing going on just after we arrived in Potosi and, when we enquired, we were told it was the Fiesta of San Juan, so we went to have a look.  What a fiesta!  First of all, there were a number of pious looking men carrying life size effigies of J.C. and then one presumably of San Juan who looked as though he had an advanced case of piles from the anguished expression on his face.

Fiesta of San Juan, the religious bit

After that the fun started.  There were at least six bands, all equipped with huge bass drums, trumpets, cornets, trombones and of course sousaphones, each band followed by groups of dancers. 

Tuba player

Sousaphones

Female cymbal player being noticed 

Trumpeter giving it his all 

Banging the big bass drum

All the fun of the fiesta

Assortment of dancers

Assortment of dancers

Male and female dancers

Male and female dancers

The male dancers were dressed in a variety of very elaborate costumes and masks, some of which appeared to be representative of conquistadors with the curly Spanish helmets and fierce red faces, others of which were more abstract and representative of various diabolical figures.  Most of the men were drinking and some of them were quite drunk but happy drunk so that they were standing there, swaying gently in the breeze trying to keep pace with the music and the other dancers and often being assisted by friends in the crowd.

Conquistador dancer

Scary male dancer

Scary male dancer

Male dancers in step

Grotesque male dancers

Grotesque male dancers with armadillo head-dresses

Male dancer with beer in hand

Male dancer, the worse for wear

Taking a breather

Head-dress back on

How much further?

That was the men.  The women were not dressed up in big costumes, in fact the women were mostly dressed in as little as possible, but they were statuesque, and their costumery involved five inch glitter clad boots, the skimpiest of dresses, long silver or metallic red, pink or blue gloves, hats with swaying feathers and they were all dancing along in perfect unison to the sound of the bands.  Alan said that he has never seen such an overt display of sexuality in his life and it was great!

Now the lovely female dancers

Rear view

Mature ladies with skirts in full swing

Enjoying a small libation

And the older ladies take part too

Much older lady dancing and swinging a rattle

The other really memorable part of our visit to Potosi was a trip to one of the mines, the mines being the silver mines of Cerro Rico, a mountain which rises imperiously above the city.  In the 17^th century Cerro Rico was the richest source of silver in the world and made Potosi one of the largest and wealthiest cities in the world.  However, this wealth was achieved at the expense of the lives of millions of indigenous forced labourers and African slaves, around eight million in a two hundred year period.

Inside Potosi Cathedral

View of Cerro Rico from Cathedral Tower window

Sue making like Liberace

View from Cathedral bell tower

View of Cerro Rico from Bell Tower

View of Potosi from Bell Tower

Very heavy bell held up with Llama hide

Main door to the Casa Real de la Moneda (Royal Mint)

Doleful Saint - Painting inside the Royal Mint (now a museum)

Holy Family with Cherubs, inside the Royal Mint

First of all, we went and had a look at the miners’ market which is where they buy their sticks of dynamite, freely on sale along with detonators, and their coca which they chew interminably.  The miners do not eat when underground but rely on coca for sustenance and energy. In fact, Pedro, our guide and ex miner, started off with a perfectly normal shaped face and by the time we’d finished going down the mines he had a lump sticking out on one side, full of coca leaves, which looked as though he had terminal toothache.

Miners' Market - get your lovely dynamite here

Street Vendor - Miners' Market

They kitted us out in boiler suits and hard hats with headlights, thank goodness, drove us up to the mine in a 4x4 and then we followed Pedro into the dark and narrow tunnels.  In some places these mines have headroom of a bit less than four feet.  Alan is a bit more than six feet, therefore he was walking bent double for part of the time, although much of the time it was possible to stand up, but our hard hats came in for a great deal of wear and tear.

Sue in full mining kit

Entrance to mine

 Once we got a little further down into the mine to the area where the last visible light could be seen from the mineshaft, we were introduced to El Tio.  El Tio (the Uncle) is the spirit of the mines.  The origin of El Tio is a little uncertain but our guide suggested that it was something to do with a former spirit which had been taken over by the Catholics and rendered more into the shape of a devil, although it is the Devil of the Mountains.  When the miners are underground, he is the boss and they make frequent offerings to him of alcohol, coca leaves and cigarettes.  He’s a strange looking fella, he has a piece of silver for a heart, he has two shining eyes, a ridiculously large and erect penis, and wellies, but he is much revered by the miners.

El Tio

Going further down, and with Alan bouncing his head off the walls of the gallery a little bit like a billiard ball, we came to a place where there were some workings.  These workings were much lower down than the gallery we were in and they were accessed down a steep hole in which the miners were hacking away at the rock that had recently been blasted out from the wall.

Every bit of rock came up to the surface in a bucket with a sort of a windlass to carry it to the gallery level and then this was offloaded into a wheelbarrow and taken out to the daylight and into a waiting lorry.  Each wheelbarrow load apparently weighs up to about 150 kilos or 23.5 stones!

Mineral ore being taken by wheelbarrow out of the mine

Miner pausing for a rest

Mineral ore being loaded onto truck

Pedro told us they were about to do some shot firing and so we ought to move back up the gallery a little which we did.  Five or six sticks of dynamite made a fine booming noise and shock waves came up the gallery, closely followed by a large cloud of noxious dust.

It seemed to us that this is a very hard way to earn a living.  It’s dark, it’s dirty, it’s dangerous and amazingly physically demanding.  Life expectancy in the mines is about fifteen years with most miners falling victim to the deadly lung disease silicosis, or to accidents.  Alan was particularly moved by our brief visit and said he felt a camaraderie and a pride amongst the miners which is similar to that which one experienced in the coalfields of Yorkshire.

Alan emerging from the mine

Campesinos in conversation, Potosi Plaza

Street scene, Potosi

Country women in conversation

We would not have missed our visit to Potosi for anything but after nearly three days above 4,000 metres we were quite relieved to leave and descend to an altitude where we could breathe more normally.  Sucre, where we are now, is at a much more comfortable altitude of 2,800 metres.