Bolivia

This year it is taking us a little longer to get back to Curare than we had anticipated. Geoff acquired a short term position in Bolivia and since Linda had never been there we decided to use his job as an opportunity for a bit of land based exploration. There are no direct flights to Bolivia and getting here is a challenge. Geoff flew 36 hours from Vancouver to Los Angeles to Lima, Peru and then to La Paz whereas Linda flew Vancouver to Toronto to Lima (stayed overnight) and then to La Paz, also 36 hours. There does not seem to be any way to make the trip shorter

La Paz is unlike any other city we have visited. The airport is at an elevation of 4050 meters and is in a place named El Alto, a densely populated area covered with orange coloured brick and adobe houses, dingy shops, dirty factories and sprawling markets. Arriving by air the most remarkable sight were the dozens of white church spires poking up above the low lying houses, about one church every 10 city blocks. When we landed it was cloudy but if it had been clear we would have seen the high peaks of the Cordillera Real stretching skyward to the east. This part of Bolivia is the Altiplano, an immense nearly treeless plain (3500m to 4000m) punctuated by mountains and solitary volcanic peaks.
  
From the airport you head downward into a rugged canyon and there is the city of La Paz (3660 meters). Hundreds of cuboid mud and brick houses cling to the sides of steep cliffs (made of poorly consolidated till!!!) and spill over the canyon rim toward the city's center. This is an astonishing sight, especially because neither of us expected it to be like this.  Why would a city be located in the depths of a valley?  The answer of course is gold.

La Ciudad de Nuestra Senora de La Paz  was founded in 1548 by a Spaniard in the valley of the Rio Choqueyapu, a river with gold that was already being mined by the indigenous Aymara miners. As usual, the Spaniards seized all of the mines, exploited the people and started construction of their colonial city. Today the Rio Choqueyapu has no more gold and it has been utterly destroyed by a cocktail of toxic chemicals and dyes, human excrement, dead animals and garbage. It is a good thing that it now flows underneath the city because it stinks.

Since Geoff is working every day Linda has decided to take a few Spanish lessons. You would think that after 4 years on our boat, traveling through Spanish speaking countries, I would have a good grasp of the language and be able to speak without stuttering and thinking about every word. Sadly that is not true and I still cannot carry on a conversation at a level better than a 2 year old. I start the lessons on November 7 (4 hours per day for 5 days) and the teacher assures me that when I leave the school I will be fluent. That would be a miracle and I am not going to get my hopes up, but I should see some improvement. More on this later.

Comments

[Marie]

Good luck! Where is Jessie?