Tarija’s Sour Grapes

Colin and I arrived in Tarija early in the morning and found a nice hotel which had a little WIFI for us! We rested for the next few hours, catching up on sleep, and then chose to do a little exploring in the afternoon. Tarija is the wine capital of Bolivia – and just outside of the city are loads of beautiful rolling hills and vineyards dotted with boutique wineries. This is not a city on the typical gringo tourist trail… in fact, most of the tourists we came across while in the area were Bolivian tourists!

We wanted to learn more about the “original Chapacos” (the name for residents of Tarija) - the animals and pre-Incan cultures of the area – so we headed to the university museum. The Paleontology Museum of Tarija City contains loads of fossils of the mega fauna and dinosaurs that used to roam the valleys. My favorites were the numerous posters showing the evolution of the modern horse, cat, dog, and other animals. It also contained mummies and belongings of the indigenous Churumata and Tomata peoples, two of the groups which used to live in the area before they were scattered by the conquering Inca Empire. There isn’t much known about the pre-Incan culture… so we are just left with bones.

 

 

Since it happened to be a long weekend holiday (and tours were not running) in Tarija, Colin decided to use the next few days to catch up on some work. I thought I would wander around and see what might be open! On May 1st, after paying a visit to a couple of churches around Tarija, I decided to catch a minibus to a colonial town called San Lorenzo. It was really easy to work the bus system – they leave all the time! One short minibus ride through the countryside later and I was there.

San Lorenzo is a small but quaint little town of 3000 residents containing a home of historical significance for the Bolivian people. I walked down the streets which were beautifully decorated with dried flowers to reach the home/museum of Don Eustaquio Mendez, a Bolivian independence fighter. Mendez was a terrific fighter, persistently recovering Tarija from the Spanish royalists, and when this proved too difficult, preventing any business from being conducted in the region. He participated in dozens of battles - even loosing an arm at one point, and ultimately dying in battle! The Mendez house wasn’t open to visit (as it was a holiday) but I got to see the outside and visit some nearby fields and the cemetery.   

Once I finished exploring San Lorenzo I caught another minibus to see a lake on the other side of Tarija. The lake area (and the dam which created it) is called San Jacinto. It was a simple yet beautiful area where straw food stalls were set up for those wanting to eat by the lake. I saw boats going out onto the lake, but I decided to try the local food first.

I wasn’t sure what to order, and eventually settled on a plate of little bright red crabs called cangrejitos. And… it was really rough! While the plate was served with an appealing lemon and a spicy sauce which helped you eat more quickly, the actual dish of boiled mini crabs with their shells still on was not something I’d ever recommend. Ever. Call it desperation food. Even then I’d probably eat the lemon and hot sauce on their own, because there is just no getting over the sensation of a sharp little claw poking you in the cheek while you are trying to crunch through its salty, almost plastic-like shell. I gleefully brought home most of the scary crabs in a plastic bag for Colin to witness (I knew he’d never try it) and then hid the bag away in a drawer in our hotel room as the look of it was starting to freak us both out. Unfortunately, once we left Tarija I realized that we had actually forgotten the bag in the drawer… I would really hate to see the look of horror on the person’s face who discovers that (likely maggot-filled by then) disaster.       

On the 2nd of May I decided to pay another visit to the Casa Dorada. I had tried to visit once before and was told to come back on the 2nd in the morning as they were closed a few days for the holiday period. When I showed up at this time the door was locked and after a trip next door to the adjoining theater (where are they?) and more knocking and waiting around, eventually someone showed up. The police happened to show up at the same time as I did and I followed them inside when there were let in by a Casa Dorada employee. I (and a group of local Bolivian tourists) asked about the morning tour that was promised – and we were told there were no tours today. Huh? 

After all the hassle and waiting I was not having that. The Bolivian family gave up straight away and left, but I persisted, rooting myself to the ground and repeating that I was told to come the morning of the 2nd for a tour. The employee told me that there was an art show going on (the reason for the police as the art was valuable) and the Casa Dorada employees had been told to work at the art show – and they had therefore designated the posted times for tours at the Casa Dorada as their “break time.” HA! Turning loads of paying, expectant customers away so you can sit around and do nothing instead… Bolivian logic. 

I informed her that her explanation for the lack of tours was ridiculous and unfair for the tourists trying to visit the house, but she simply shrugged her shoulders. Finally I insisted that the manager be called so I could talk to him… lets just say that my persistence got me what I wanted and she was told to take me on a tour of the house. A few other foreign tourists happened to show up as she was letting me inside and they were able to join what ended up being the only tour the house ran that day. One of the tourists said to me mid-tour, ‘We’re so lucky, we were told they weren’t running tours for some reason today!’     

The Casa Dorada is the former Art Noveau residence of the wealthy European import business duo Moisés Navajas Ichazo and his wife Esperanza Morales Serrano. It is an absolutely stunning house both outside and inside. On the outside it is decorated with beautifully ornate gold and silver statues, doorways, and carved features. Both this, and the dark orange inside were designed by the Swiss-Italian architects Antonio and Miguel Camponovo and built (in the early 1900’s) using local foundational materials but imported decorative objects such as the furniture and numerous statues.  

Our group was led up the white marble stairs to the reception salon and dining rooms which had lush red carpets and beautiful warm gold features. The furniture really was straight out of any palace in Europe. There was even a chapel for private worship, though because the owner Moisés was originally a descendent of Sephardi Jews from Spain, there was a Star of David present downstairs as well. As we were led around these rooms and through the bedrooms our guide told us about the import business of the owners. The couple had decided to make the bottom floor as series of storefronts so they could display and sell the goods they imported. In one of the rooms I noticed a small box which was labeled ‘banana.’ It seemed to be a box of scents/flavors and I asked about it. It was an example of an import good – old-school artificial food flavoring!          

The Casa Dorada eventually became a city museum because the couple did not have any children and their nieces and nephews (who had inherited the house) let it fall into disrepair. It is a beautiful place to see if you manage to force a visit when in Tarija!

After my visit of the Golden House I decided it was time to try out the wine of Tarija. For this I caught another minibus to the Valle de Concepcion, passing by loads of vineyards. I first came across the Casa Vieja where I wandered around to see the grapes and processing before trying some of their wine which was bottled up in these massive jugs. There were overly sweet white dessert wines, quite bitter red wines – the best thing I tasted was actually a clear brandy called singani. The wine was laughably bad, but hey – it was still free.       

Wandering to the main square I found a taxi driver to take me on a short scenic drive to a nearby mirador of the canyons.

My taxi driver dropped me off at another winery where I was able to go on a little tour of the place and try its boutique wine Infiernillo. My guide took me into a museum which was filled with dozens of animal skins. I asked her where they came from and she said that her uncle hunted the animals (I recognized numerous puma, jaguar, ocelot, peccary, skunks, and loads more cats and other animals) in the mountains. I felt sick to my stomach seeing the huge amount of big cats just one person had killed – Bolivians really need some education pronto before they hunt all the endangered animals of South America to death. 

The rest of the tour included a walk through the vineyards, a dark ‘Tunnel of Love’ the owners had built, and a sampling of their wine. Not only did they slaughter endangered animals, but their wine was THE WORST wine I had ever tasted. The first Bolivian wines I tried (both at the previous vineyard and one bought from a store) had been quite bad, but this one was sickening. Every type (all 5 or so) I tried was very sour, very bitter, very thin, and very very nauseating. Considering it is extremely polluted and dirty in Bolivia (trash everywhere in the countryside here and soaking in the water used to irrigate plants) I think if you drink Bolivian wine you are either uninformed or have some kind of a death wish! YUCK.   

I couldn’t stomach any more so I quickly got a ride back to Tarija. It was nearly 3:00 pm and I wanted to see the art show which had almost denied my Casa Dorada entrance. It turned out to be a small collection from the Casa de la Moneda in Potosi… but some interesting pieces! It was religious art, portraits of various patron saints, and some dark stuff!

I returned to the hotel that afternoon to rest and it is a good thing I did… I would need the energy to deal with my next fight for service. The next morning Colin and I had bought bus tickets to Potosi for a scheduled 7:00 am departure… which, while we showed up bright and early, the bus never did. After a few phone calls made by the bus station attendants we found out that not enough people bought bus tickets. SO THE BUS COMPANY CANCELED THE BUS. No one informed us, no one was even THERE at the bus company counter to let us know what was going on, refund our money, or provide help with alternative tickets. It wasn’t until I started telling the bus station attendants we had to catch a flight from the next city that they moved at any pace faster than snail. Eventually (despite originally being told there were no buses to Potosi until the evening) we got ourselves on another bus a couple hours later.

I was NOT going to miss the Tinku festival in Potosi due to Bolivian mismanagement! In Bolivia, you have to fight to get what you are promised because disappointment is a dime a dozen here.

Francesca 

The Red Rocks Of Tupiza

We had been in the heart of the central Andean plateau for some weeks, including spending many days in Uyuni at over 3700 meters above sea level. Nothing prepared us for the heart-stopping beauty and gut-wrenching fear of our next bus journey across the winding high mountain roads, to our next destination, Tupiza. At a more sensible altitude of around 3160 meters (still extremely hard to breathe and move around at the same time), the city was a small gathering of adobe and red clay houses nestled within the quebradas, or surrounding valleys. Bolivian driving standards being what they are, we were pleasantly surprised when we did not join the several vehicles we saw dotting the bottom of the colorful canyons – burnt out far below the road in some long ago terrible accident. Many Bolivians enjoy the new craze of drinking 96% proof alcohol from 50 cent plastic bottles available all over the country – and then they recklessly drive around – which no doubt contributes to the relatively low life expectancy of 69 (below that of both Mongolia and North Korea).

In fact, the first thing we saw when we left the bus station to look for a place to stay was a young Bolivian passed out on the road, with his head lolled over on the sidewalk, and his legs in the gutter. We asked a lady if he was dead, and she told us no, he was just drunk – confirmed when we saw him again in the same drunk position the next day, but in a different part of town.

Our place was basic, as was the town itself. With only one ATM, and some pretty dodgy restaurants, we still managed to find something cool to do. Tupiza Tours are a good tourist agency in Tupiza itself, and we signed up for their Triathlon Tour which other Western tourists also were signed up for, making it cheaper. The Triathlon is named for the three modes of transport which you take on the tour; your legs, for hiking through the Cañon del Duende (Elf Canyon), a horse, for riding to the Cañon del Inca, and lastly, a mountain bike, for a rapid descent down Tupiza’s very own Death Road, from El Sillar.

The tour company were very friendly, and they provided all the equipment and a Spanish-only guide for us (luckily everyone could speak Spanish). The guide drove professionally and well, and we enjoyed the tour and the company of the other people. Our first stop was to the North of the town, at a rock formation called La Poronga, which in this part of the world is slang for a penis! The red rocks of the sandstone all around the towns formed some really amazing shapes caused by wind and rain erosion. Our guide was telling us that the people on the outskirts of town grew lots of vegetables to earn a living, much as they had hundreds of years ago. The Tupiza River was the only source of water in the region, and was a green and lush strip through what was otherwise a thorny and arid landscape. This used to be a huge gold and silver mecca, but those minerals have all pretty much dried up now. This was supposedly the area where Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid robbed a payroll guard before making their last stand in a nearby town where they died.

Our next stop was the aforementioned trek through the Elf Canyon. It seemed to be named not after a mythical local creature, but for the fact that the canyon seemed to come straight out of a dream in which Elves might reside. A surreal valley, the canyon started at a natural rock gate which we walked through and then followed the dry riverbed for a few kilometers until we came to some narrow caves leading through the rock face. We were just talking about whether they had big cats there, when we saw a dried-up dead dog which someone had propped up as though it were some zombie Puma running at Francesca, making her scream out loud in shock! We almost died laughing.

We made our way back with the others to the jeep, past huge swarms of flies and wasps, following the horse tracks back to the entrance to the canyon. Our next stop was some awesome lunch the driver had bought with us. We ate the lunch next to a flowing part of the river, where we saw the evidence of the region’s regular flooding as it had partially covered the whole picnic area with a mudflow. The cloudburst rains they have around Tupiza just runs off of the impenetrable red rocks causing lots of flash floods. We used the chairs of the picnic area which were like kid’s chairs, because the mud had covered the bottom few feet making them really small!

The food was really tasty and filling. Sandwiches, fruit and snacks were all complementary to some pre-Hispanic food called Humitas. A corn husk is stuffed with llama meat and vegetables, boiled and then served in the husk itself which is wrapped up and tied. These were extremely delicious and very filling which was good, because we had a lot of physical activity planned for the afternoon.

First up was going to one of the stables on the edge of town and becoming acquainted with our horses. Mine was OK, but Francesca’s horse kept biting all the other horses. The guide left us in the capable hands of the horse trainers/guides, and they even told us that my horse was named Crazy or something – but they probably say that to everyone.

We took the horses for several kilometers out of town through the beautiful red canyons to the Inca Canyon, South West of Tupiza. We passed many rock formations such as La Puerta del Diablo (Devil’s Gate) and La Valle de los Machos (phallic rocks named after the macho men of the region). We uncomfortably galloped for some sections which I quickly learnt was exhausting for the uninitiated. So when we arrived at the Inca Canyon, we let the horses drink water, and we all relaxed and hung out. Francesca’s horse decided to pee in the water, but it did not bother the other horses who carried on drinking greedily. Gross.

We got back in the middle of the afternoon to the van, and we reluctantly parted with our cool horses. It was good to be away from their smells however. Next up? Mountain biking.

This time, we headed North, through and then again out of town. I did not realize it at first, but we quickly climbed up to over 4000 meters! We would be biking down the steep mountain roads with all the crazy Bolivian drivers, at over 4000 meters above sea level!

The views were amazing, with colorful rocks and strange formations all over the place. The flora was dense and thorny, but still green and very beautiful. The only animal we saw that day was a dead snake, which we examined thoroughly. Francesca decided biking was not for her, particularly because of the gravelly, slippery and uneven road we would be travelling down, but she is an awesome girlfriend, and took loads of pictures and videos of me from the safety of the car (with the guide, his wife and their kid).

It took over an hour to go down, and I took it pretty carefully at first to test out the bike’s capabilities, and to stay in shot for some pictures from Francesca. After a while though I began drifting out in front of the other bikers on the tour, and found myself pleasantly engaged with nature, spotting llamas and alpacas grazing by the side of the road. The views were breath-taking, and if we don’t bike down ‘Death Road’ near La Paz, this will certainly make up for it.

We got back to town after dark, and to my surprise everyone had kept up with me and the jeep. Exhausted, we all handed our equipment back in outside the tour agency, and dragged our asses off to bed. The next day I spent in bed, and Francesca took some nice pictures of the plaza. I would ache for the next three days, but it was a good kind of ache, and Tupiza’s beautiful scenery was a highlight of travelling through the beautifully varied country of Bolivia. The food was completely hit and miss though, with the Milan Centre Pizzeria, certainly being the best, and the Tupiza Pizzeria Ristorante being the worst. In fact, Francesca was very upset to find a wriggling caterpillar in her sandwich from there. This place is not to be confused with the well-named Tu Pizza, pizzeria, though. Hopefully the fare would be better in the next town. Located in the middle of Bolivia’s wine country, Francesca will tell you all about Tarija…