Ambue Ari Animals - Part One

Back in San Francisco now and it’s time to catch up on the last month of blogging before all the memories of my trip slip away. Well, I’ll start back at the park, where I got to know some amazing animals. I spent most of my time in quarantine, but also hung out with some of the house animals, who I’ll begin with.
The first animal I met when I arrived was Herbie the tapir. He was a huge love, but hated being locked up. His enclosure was fairly large but completely barren because he had long ago stripped it of plants and they weren’t replaced, aside from the patuju leaves he was given to eat at each meal. His life centered around mealtimes and planning his escapes. In our first week there, he escaped three or four times. Each time, he was found happily roaming around and herded back home by a large group of people using bribery in the form of bananas. He loved getting visitors and would lick us constantly with his huge tapir tongue, but was visibly miserable most of the time. One of his escapes entailed using his immense weight to push over the fence and jump into the lake on the other side. He happily swam around, completely oblivious to the petrified cat on a leash whose territory he had entered. I only heard about this later, but it was apparently quite the entertaining but frightening scene – the cat fled from the person walking her, and the goofy tapir joyfully frolicked in the water. Puma and tapir were both caught and returned to their enclosures and a resolution was made to repair Herbie’s house.
But he escaped again the next morning and was escorted down to the large enclosure we had in quarantine. Poor guy did not want to enter but was lured in with his beloved bananas and the door was padlocked shut, leaving a despondent tapir inside. Herbie’s care was passed on to us in quarantine because of the nature of the area. But it still did not make sense to have him in an area reserved for the new and sick animals (though many of our animals didn’t even fall into this category) so it was just a whole contradictory mess. This enclosure was smaller than his original area, which was slowly being repaired, but he was at least kept occupied by eating all the plants. It had been an aviary was so adorned with lush vegetation. We watched each day as plants were devoured and trees knocked down and the jungle turned into a desert. Herbie seemed much content in this enclosure, as shown by his actually lying down to rest in his bed rather than constantly pacing. Yet he still wanted to get out, frequently jumping up on the fencing and extending his trunk up high, making a huge clatter as he banged around. In cages on the other side of the fence were most of our quarantine animals, including two small monkeys who were especially frightened of the new arrival.
It was not a good situation and we were relieved when a week later Herbie was finally escorted back to his original enclosure. I didn’t see him there, but I’m sure he was not happy to be back. We had quite a few discussions with the higher ups about ways to better things for Herbie, including taking him on walks, widening his enclosure to include a lake, or best of all, letting him free, but all we got in response were excuses – he was too stubborn to walk on a leash, he would disturb the cats if he was out, the lake belonged to the cat, etc. Although fairly domesticated, Herbie was still plenty capable of finding food and surviving on his own. He was such a sweet animal and I loved spending time with him, but it was so sad to see his stress and misery rather than the carefree attitude he showed during his rare moments of joy.
When Herbie was moved to the large aviary in quarantine, Chichi Richi the macaw was living there, and despite our protests, they were locked up together for the night. Chichi Richi was obviously aghast and spent the night squawking in fear and hiding at the top of her enclosure. Herbie was a gentle giant, but all that she knew was there was a giant in her house and that wasn’t okay. In the morning we moved the poor bird into a small cage in old quarantine where she had to stay for several days. We had been working already on repairing one of the aviaries in main camp so that we could move her there, but we still had a lot of work to do. After hours of patching up holes and weak areas on the ceilings and walls and securing the fencing to the ground, we cleared out the enclosure with the help of the house animal crew and they prepared it for their new addition. As I was working on the fence, one of the (nameless) macaws on the other side followed me closely to the point where I had to be careful not to grab his feathers with my fliers. He always wore a very curious expression, and bent his head down for me to scratch him through the fence. When I went in to visit him, he immediately climbed up on my arm and wouldn’t let me leave, jumping back up the moment I would attempt to put him down.
It was really rewarding watching Chichi’s joyous reaction when we released her into her new home after being traumatized by a tapir and then locked in a strange small enclosure. She had lived with some of the other macaws previously but with her dominance and aggression, stressed them out to the point of feather picking and not eating, so was moved to quarantine. Her new aviary bordered that of the other macaws and surprise, surprise, there were constant threats exchanged across the fence and the two males on the other side began fighting with each other, feather picking, and not eating. Tessa worked in house animals and after a lot of pushing, was given the resources to put a tarp up between the aviaries to reduce some of the macaws’ stress.
Chichi Richi didn’t used to be so aggressive and bad with other birds and people, apparently. She had been paired with Lorenzo, another blue and gold macaw, but Lorenzo fell in love with Sarah, one of the volunteers who runs the park. Lorenzo was allowed to roam freely, and Chichi Richi was locked up on her own, where she developed a resentment towards other brown-haired females and lost her ability to get along with other birds. Lorenzo was a very attractive and talkative macaw who spent his time around main camp following Sarah around but biting anybody else who came up to him. He was pretty funny to watch as he hung upside down from a clothesline but then decided it was more fun to chew on the socks hanging next to him.
He also kept us entertained with his constant chattering, repeatedly shouting hola into the kitchen during mealtimes or when someone walked by him. Tessa fed him daily and he started to follow her around a bit, but the rest of us had to keep our distance from him because he certainly wasn’t the friendliest. Though there was one odd afternoon where he climbed onto my arm and acted friendly for a moment, but then gave me the evil eye and I got Tessa to quickly move him away from me; macaw bites are no fun.
People frequently took out one of the house animals to sit on the bench with them. Gordo, a green parrot, couldn’t fly but loved to hang out with people. He was quite the chatterbox as well with the constant ‘Gordo’, ‘hola’, and a lengthy jumbled phrase that I could never make out the words out. He would lift his wings on command to show off his gorgeous features, and was usually quite friendly. I did get a nice bite on my thumb, though, when I reached out my arm for him to step up but he wanted to sit on someone else’s shoulder instead.
Another sad case in house animals was Rudolpho the deer. I went in to visit him on my first day and he gave me a full bath, loving the salt on my skin. He seemed very happy and friendly that day, but I later learned otherwise. He had previously lived with Bambi, another deer who had been Herbie’s best friend, but had mauled her to death with his horns. Since then, he had been on his own and not given much attention or care because people no longer liked him. His enclosure shared a fence with Herbie’s and there were gaps in the fence, so he sometimes moved back and forth, at least getting some company from Herbie. I only heard stories of this from Tessa, but apparently he got pretty beat up by the fence one day and was covered in lacerations. We talked to the vets about it, but nothing was done and the poor guy took a long time to heal, partly because he wasn’t receiving adequate nutrition and clearly needed a salt lick.
In house animals were also a hoard of flying green parrots, three toucans, an aviary with several calm birds who couldn’t fly, four chanchos (wild pigs/peccaries) who ate our kitchen scraps, and two adorable pios (ostrich-like animals) named Matt and Damon. One night I put the pios to bed, which entailed herding the unwilling creatures into their shed – I got up behind one of them and used all my weight to push him in the right direction as he looked back and hissed at me like a goose. They were put in their house to keep warm and be safe from predators, though I never understood why they couldn’t just go into their shed when they wanted to, or why they were even there in the first place.
Aside from my quarantine creatures, the other animal I interacted with was Lazy Cat the ocelot. Since we didn’t work with cats, we were given a half day walk along with a cat. Lazy Cat definitely lived up to her name and didn’t want to leave her enclosure. Her walker attached herself to Lazy using a system of ropes and carabineers and tried to let Lazy lead the way, but that was hard when all she wanted to do was eat frogs or nap in the sun. At one point, she ran a bit along her trail, but mostly just lazed along and stretched out like a big house cat. She also had the attitude of a house cat – she was very domesticated but moody and only did what she wanted to do. She crawled into my lap at one point wanting to be stroked, but quickly got mouthy and I had to stand up. She enjoyed chewing on arm hair, so I allowed her to trim mine for a bit until she got overly playful and started batting at my arms. The cats get fed once a day so after her afternoon walk, we wrapped chunks of meat in patuju leaves and hid them throughout her enclosure. We then stepped outside and watched her bounce around and find her treasures, climbing up posts and along platforms to reach her precious meal. It was a very cool experience to walk with her, but also felt a lot like I was just with a gorgeous large house cat on a leash. More on my take of the walking and keeping of wild cats later.
That’s all for now – next up, quarantine animals.

Construction

When we weren’t working directly on the animals’ areas, we did quite a bit of construction. The animals used to be in old quarantine, which had even tinier rotting wooden cages and room for very few creatures. We used it at times for one reason or another, such as when the tapir escaped and was temporarily housed in the large aviary that had held one macaw who understandably didn’t want to share her house with this huge creature (story later). New quarantine had been initiated a few months before with larger, sturdier metal enclosures that were easier to clean and could be enlarged. The pigs and tortoises had larger dirt areas in which to roam, and we had three birds and two monkeys in an adjacent enclosed area, each in their own (far too small) cage. Our first project when I arrived was to repair one of the aviaries at main camp so that we could move Chichi Richi (our macaw displaced by the tapir) there – she was only in quarantine because they had nowhere else for her to go. Yeah, the whole idea behind quarantine there is pretty contradictory! I was initially very unsure in my use of wire cutters, pliers, and construction with fencing material in general, but I soon was adept in patching up the holes around the old aviary. My hands certainly didn’t appreciate my gripping the tools as I cut out patches and twisted wires in ways that they didn’t want to move., and it was hard to work for long periods reaching upwards, sometimes standing at the top of a shaky ladder. It seemed like we would never finish, as we found hole after hole on the high roof, rusty bits in much of the old wiring that needed to be replaced, and parts where the fencing wasn’t secured to the ground. We eventually had to settle leaving some small holes and hope that people would continue to keep an eye on them. After securing the door with latches and more wiring, we finally were done with the construction bit and passed on the job to the people on house animals to put up perches and get the aviary ready for its new inhabitant.
Our next construction job was the chancho pen. In new quarantine, we just had two pig areas, and we got a new pig at the beginning of my stay who was placed in the same enclosure as Duncan. They did not get along at all, so we moved Duncan temporarily to old quarantine. The new pig only needed to be quarantine for a week since he had previously done a full quarantine period at the other park, but the chancho pen at main camp had lots of escape holes. It was up to us to fill in the holes and secure the pen so that poor little Duncan could get this home back. Having no idea what we were doing aside from being told to dig trenches and fill them in with cement, one of the other volunteers and I began this task one afternoon. We dug as far as the hard earth would allow us in the three main stretches where the fence wasn’t secured, and collected rocks that would surround these areas when we poured in the cement. It was then time to experiment with the cement, minus any equipment. Three portions of sand, one portion of cement, and water to desired consistency, we were told. We hunted down a bag of cement and filled a wheelbarrow with sand from the side of the road. Found a cracked tub that would work to mix our concoction, filled a bucket with water, and trowel in hand, we hauled our goodies along the bumpy path to the chancho pen. We started with a really small batch of cement since we had no idea how it would work – our first bit was kind of dry, but turned nice and cement0like when we added some more water. By evening, we had filled in our smallest hole with a combination of our mixture and heavy rocks cemented along the side. The next morning, our work from the day before looked like it was solidifying well, so we made a nice big batch with nine shovels of sand and three shovels of cement. Mix, mix, mix it around in our cracked little tub that was a bit too small for the task, attempted to get a nice blend of colors rather than distinct streaks and clumps of grey and brown. One of us sloshed in a good amount of water while the other mixed it around, the stirring getting easier as our gigantic cake turned into batter. We dumped the tub into our holes, spreading it around and making the surfaces even with the trowel as our spatula, pressing rocks into the sides and filling in the sides so everything would be glued together. No idea why, but the gate had been locked and the walk to get wire cutters to break in was farther than we wanted to venture, so one of us would hop over the barbed wire fence to even things out from the inside of the pen. Didn’t get pricked by the fence or stuck at all there, though I did brush against a very spiny tree on as I hopped over one side of the pen, though thankfully all it attacked was my jacket. After making a latch on the door that could actually be opened by humans, we gave the area a few days to dry.
Then it was time to move our pig from quarantine world into the general population. He would be by himself, but shared a wall with the other four chanchos and was supposed to be moved in with them after an adjustment period, though that has yet to happen. Quarantine is quite a walk from the chancho pen and we had already discovered when the other chanchos escaped how hard it was to herd them back, so doing a food bribery walk or using a leash weren’t options. We found an appropriate sized but very heavy cage as well as some delicious bribery and slowly carried the awkward contraption over to collect the chancho we had deemed Big Pig aka Bacon, but the organization later officially named Romantico. We were unsure how willing he would be to enter the cage, but pigs are pigs! At first he reached his snout in, grabbed a treat we had dropped, and ran away with it. But we got smarter and held a banana inside one end of the cage so that he had to actually take it from us rather than grab it from the ground. He tried to reach for it and back away, but as soon as he stepped part way into the cage, I shoved the big guy from behind and slid the door shut. Poor thing, but it was better for him to be over at main camp, where he where he would enjoy all of the scraps and leftovers from our meals rather than the boring healthy fruits and vegetables that he got in quarantine. Many of the chanchos are very vocal so we were afraid he would be screaming on the entire journey to his new home, but he didn’t make a peep. No scrambling in circles, no panicking – clearly not comfortable with the bumpy ride and strange situation, but he didn’t seem too terribly stressed. We borrowed a guy who was on construction to help us carry the big, and he had a much easier time lifting his side of the cage than we did. When we finally arrived at his new home, I opened up the door, but he just stood there puzzled, probably too much in shock to know that he was free to roam. I tipped the cage a little bit to get his attention and it suddenly clicked in his head and out he popped to explore his surroundings and chat with his new neighbors, who he seemed to get along with quite nicely.
Chancho transferred out of quarantine, our next project was to build another cage in new quarantine using the metal frame. All put together, they look quite simple, but it was actually quite the task. First came the flooring, for which we used the semi-flexible diamond fencing. With a ragged old tape measure that started at 3 meters, we cut out the appropriately sized piece and secured it to the frame. To get the wire that we used to secure everything, we had to cut the ends of a wire from the role of fencing and twist until it was free. Then one person held each end with pliers and backed away from each other to straighten out the series of bends. We discovered later that it was much easier to have one person hold onto the roll of fencing and the other simply yank out the last wire on the role, the force of the yank straightening the wire in the process. We measured and cut out all the other pieces for the cage – the large pieces and really difficult to cut out because we had a small space in which to unroll the very heavy fencing that kept poking us and trying to roll itself back up again. To make the pieces easier to attach, we tipped the cage onto its side so everything was a little bit lower, though tipping it was difficult because we were in the confines of a fenced area with a roof that the frame repeatedly got caught on and we needed to dislodge it with a stick. Even standing on a log, I was too short to do much of the higher parts, though did have to stand on my toes at time to keep the fencing raised high enough while the only guy amongst us secured the higher pieces. The work got harder as got closer to finishing because we needed to work the wires around more fencing without having the freedom of open space. Triangle pieces, various rectangles, correct lining up of fencing to fit on the door without leaving any stray sharp edges that might poke the cage’s inhabitant. It took several days of work, but was really nice to get finished. It was to either be a spare cage if another animal came or to be converted into a double for Titi, the little monkey in a single cage who would probably be there forever.
On my last day of work,, I asked the vet if any animals would be arriving soon and he said no, so I started the process of connecting the cage to Titi’s. I made a box plenty large enough for her to pass through and connected it to the side of the new empty cage. Pushed the cage close enough to Titi’s so that the edges of my box slid against the side of her cage, and then connected the box to her cage as well. It was really hard to push the wire around so many different corners and through the right holes, so I ended up going into Titi’s house to push the wires to the outside, and then was able to twist them into the right positions and tighten them as I stood in the narrow passageway. I cut a hole in the wall of the new cage so that she would be able to pass through the box into the second room, but didn’t have time to go any further. Hopefully people will finish the job soon by decorating the new cage with branches, platforms, and vegetation, and then open up the hole on her end so that she can pass through and have more space. She’s very shy and not very active, but it still wasn’t fair for her to have that little space, especially for an indefinite amount of time.
The other project of my last few days was clearing out the aviary that Herbie (tapir) had destroyed during his temporary stay. It had been this amazing large enclosure with tons of live vegetation, perches and branches all around, very green and jungly. But during his time in the enclosure, Herbie mowed down the entire place, knocking over all the trees and munching on them, eating all of the plants, leaving a massive pile of poop in one corner. It wasn’t Herbie’s fault at all and at least he was happy with tons of goodies to eat, but it was pretty sad to watch the enclosure be destroyed day by day until it was just a desert scattered with dead plant remains. When he left, we cleared out the area with the intention to remake the aviary (though not nearly as nice as it had been with live plants). Buried all the poop because it was way too much to lug out, and spent several mornings carrying bag after bag of debris over to a compost pile. Raking, scooping, stuffing everything into sacks, using machetes to chop up the remains of all the dead pieces. It was a really exhausting task, but was nice when the area was swept clean and all that remained were the few live plants and a smooth dirt ground. Unfortunately got the verdict from the vets that we couldn’t move any of our birds to this area when it had been turned back into an aviary – because they were in quarantine, they wanted them in the tiny cages so that they could be observed more closely. I argued with this quite a bit but they were set on their opinion. Poor JR the toucan has almost no space to hop around, and Captain the macaw is desperate to get into a large area. If the animals were actually sick or being observed more closely, this would make more sense, but there is really no monitoring done aside from what I established with the logging. So the clearing out of the cage ended up being pretty futile because at this point no one is even going in that nice big area, but hopefully it will come to some use soon.
My hands are pretty hideous from my time at the park - monkey nibbles, mosquito and spider bites that I’m awful at not scratching, holes in my fingers from which I’ve removed endless thorns and spines, scratches from wires, and blisters from pliers.
I still have tons and tons to write about my time there, and will catch up bit by bit as I’m going along. Right now we’re in Rurrenabaque, soon to embark on a three day pampas tour and then a three day jungle tour with an indigenous guide.

Jungle Chases

My time at Ambue Ari wasn’t what I had hoped it would be due to some political and hierarchical issues that I will get into later, but it was still an amazing experience. I didn’t write while I was there aside from jotting down some notes, and I don’t really know where to start here.
One of my first days there, before I knew my way around the main area of camp or had done anything much with the animals, we were lounging around and someone made the ‘coo-eee’ warning call. Everyone jumped up and looked around frantically to see where the noise was coming from, and someone shouted out for us to head towards the monkeys. I sprinted along with the others, none of us having any idea what was going on. We got the sense that maybe one of the monkeys had escaped and we were trying to catch him, and the Bolivians motioned something about spacing ourselves ten meters apart and advancing through the jungle quietly. We would stop and listen, looking into the vegetation, but didn’t know what to listen for. We crept on through, pushing through the dense plants, unsure what we were even looking for. People started running again, so I raced along after them. They leapt at full speed over branches on the path, sped around curves, flew through the jungle. I felt like I was trying to keep up with Mowgli from Jungle Book.
After about twenty minutes of sprinting in circles through the jungle and following the lead of Bolivians shouting out commands, someone in the know stopped moving for long enough to tell the clueless among us that we were chasing after a hunter. A volunteer walked by carrying two howler monkeys on his shoulder, so I had the impression that everything was happening at once – a hunter was on the loose and monkeys had escaped, or maybe the hunter had let the monkeys out as a diversion or to shoot them. The park is protected land and hunters and fisherman are prohibited. He had been in the park to shoot agoutis, the fairly large rodents that roam around freely. One of the Bolivians had been out walking, heard a shot, and found the hunter, who pointed the gun at him and told him not to make a sound. The hunter ran away, at which point Hymei shouted out and we all ran into the jungle, staying close together to intimdate him in number if we found him.
After about forty five minutes, we headed back to camp and got more of the story on what we had been searching for; I got the impression that the escaped monkeys and the hunter were completely separate and coincidental incidents. Someone had brought back a dead agouti that had been shot in the mouth but abandoned by the hunter when he was discovered. People rode up and down the road to see if the hunter had left a motorcycle on the road,, but nothing was to be found and eventually the search was exhausted. Several hours later, there was another shout and commotion, but by the time I put on my shoes, the search party had disappeared into the jungle. They came back not too long afterwards leading a shamefaced fisherman and carrying a stake laden with freshly caught fish. Not knowing anything yet about the way things worked at the park yet, I was shocked that there were three such dramatic events in just a few hours – escaped monkeys, a hunter, and a fisherman. As the story was gradually unveiled, it became clear that the monkeys were out already; they were allowed to roam free during the day and they were simply brought back to keep them under reigns and away from the hunter during the uproar. The hunter and fisherman had been out together and separated when we sieged the area. Several of the larger guys kept the fisherman enclosed in the office while they waited for the director to come. A bit later, the man was led, head down, to the road and taken to the police station in Guarayos to be questioned. The ordeal with him apparently went out for several days, but he eventually revealed the identity of the hunter and he was arrested as well – though I have no idea what form of reprimand they received.
Prior to this incident, the park had a system where two people were assigned every morning to dawn patrol, where they would walk along the road within the limits of the park land to hopefully scare off any lurking poachers. But after the eventful evening, everyone put up a big argument about how unreasonable and unsafe this was – what could a few volunteers do when faced in the early morning with a hunter with a gun, and how would our presence even deter them? Dawn patrol was put on hold for about a week, and then they reinstated it just on weekends for now, the time when everyone around knows that there are less volunteers at the park because Saturday afternoons are off. The group sizes were increased from two to six plus, they were given blindingly bright flashlights, and people signed up for the task voluntarily rather than being assigned to it. We were also all encouraged to stay at the park rather than go into town in the evenings and on afternoons off. So changes were made after the afternoon of chases, but it still remains a pretty awful system for which they have yet to find a good solution.
Much less dramatic was my daily routine. I would wake every morning at 6:30 to the shouts and banging on the door of the person assigned to wake up duty, sometimes supplemented by the much more pleasant sound of music. Nice and warm in my sleeping bag under my mosquito net, on the bottom bunk in my dorm room that was dark from the tarps pulled down to keep out the wind, it was hard to get up in the cold morning. I usually stayed in bed until just before seven, at which point I pulled on my dirty clothes and hiking boots and headed to the animal kitchen to prepare breakfast. Most of the others had morning jobs that varied daily and weekly, but being in quarantine, that was where we stayed. I had breakfast com on my first day before starting quarantine, which was pretty awful, having to clean up the mess that people had left from the night before and then clean the dishes that quite a few kindred people had decided not to do themselves. It was really nice to not have to wake up each morning to the surprise of a dreaded task like bathroom duty, but to head straight into the routine of feeding my animals. It went fairly quickly when there were four or five of us, though some mornings several wouldn’t show unless we went and dragged them out of bed, but it definitely turned into a time crunch as our numbers dwindled down. We picked out a selection of fruit, veggies, and seeds from the various storage areas, as well as a cup of milk with calcium for our piglet. Always had to pop a head into the kitchen to make sure that the oatmeal was on for the monkeys, and then wait until the monkey men (the guys who worked in monkey park) had mixed in two capfuls of vitamins before taking a jug. Washed the food, soaked it in an iodine solution, set out our colorful plastic tubs and buckets, one for each enclosure. When a knife could be found amidst the morning bustle and knife shortage in the kitchen, cut the food into appropriately sized pieces and distributed it among the bowls – tomatoes and cabbage for the tortoises and pigs, big chunks of yucca and potatoes for the bigger pigs and smaller pieces for the baby. Everyone loved cucumber and apples. Bananas and papayas or melon for the monkeys, birds, and coati. Searched for our three quarantine water jugs that always seemed to go missing and filled them with water from the house, using getting pretty wet shoes as well. A slosh of the hot sweetened oatmeal was poured into one bowl stacked on top of a second for the two monkeys in the new quarantine, and the rest remained in the jug and was carried with four plates to the coati and night monkeys. Depending on how many of us were awake and present, also taking into account who was too afraid to feed Teangi (our food-aggressive coati), we split off to deliver the goods. My favorite was to do the night monkey and Teangi route, visiting a bit with the animals as I picked up their old food, usually scolded the night monkeys for not eating their oatmeal from the day before, cleaned their platforms and refreshed their water bowls, and placed their food in various places around the enclosure for them to find throughout the morning.
In the past, all food had been placed on patuju leaves on the platforms, but when I arrived, the other quarantine volunteers had just begun to process of hiding the food as a form of enrichment, except for with the birds, two of whom had difficulty getting around and the other who was too aggressive to reach very far into his small enclosure without getting a nice toucan peck. My first few days, we fed three meals a day, which we all agreed was excessive and led to wasted food, wasted time, and the inability to monitor appetite or food preferences. We spoke to the head vet about our concerns and were at first strongly refuted, but we pressed on and he eventually allowed us to do a week trial of just breakfast and dinner, which proved successful and will hopefully continue on beyond my departure. We still gave a lunchtime banana to Captain, the blue macaw who had arrived recently and in a very malnourished state, as well as a small lunch to Duncan the piglet, though that is probably being cut out because he is getting quite the belly. The tortoises were hardly eating in the cold weather so for them we put out lunch rather than breakfast, and it was nice to see them crawl over and munch on a chunk of cucumber as I laid it down rather than just stay huddled in their shells and leave the food to spoil.
After washing up the dishes and hanging them up to dry, we waited for the 8am breakfast call (or when there were fewer of us, finished work late and didn’t get to the comedor till everyone else had begun). When someone on breakfast com called out desayauno, everyone scrambled into the line to get dishes, two bread rolls, butter, occasional dinner leftovers, and a cup of hot chocolate, coffee, or tea. Breakfast was the meal that never filled anyone up, so we supplemented it with purchases from town that we kept in a closed bin to keep out the rats and cockroaches. Instant oatmeal with hot water and milk powder, sweetened with a spoonful of jam or dulce de leche. We put spreads on the bread, which we occasionally toasted over the gas stove as water was boiling if Tessa or I finished our morning tasks early. Occasionally bought a boiled egg that the park sold or cheese empanadas from the empanada lady who came to make a very quick and easy sale of her full basket. There was usually a long line by the bench when she showed up and Lorenzo, the macaw who had free reign of camp, liked to sit by her basket and bug her, pecking at her clothes or the napkins.
Following breakfast were anuncios, which were sometimes far too long and ridiculous, first introducing new volunteers and bidding farewell and thank you to those departing, and then going into any special plans or assignments for the day as well as addressing the constant drama of some sort or other. Washed up our dishes and by 9 or 9:30, started the day’s work. In quarantine, we were very self-directed, as the park is so focused on cats that the other animals are a bit neglected. When I arrived, there was almost no information in the quarantine binder, but the others were in the process of a food trial which they documented, as well as writing up a hygiene protocol and a daily and weekly schedule. I made behavior logs for each individual animal for us to note anything of significance including changes in behavior, appetite, environment, health, etc, because there were really no records or ways to notice patterns or pass on important information to future volunteers. Also got all of the records from the vets and used them to make an inventory of the animals that we had, including what little information there was on species, gender, arrival date, and history. It was disappointing with how little there was, with very little if any background information, no exam write ups whatsoever, the only notations after their arrival being the date that an anti-parasitic medication was administered. I also made a construction project list, including the dates that we had finished our projects as well as things that need to be done in the future. We stuffed all of what we had written into our folder, which unfortunately wasn’t an easy-to-use binder like all of the cats had for the charts that volunteers filled in daily). On one of my last days, I organized our paperwork into categories within the folder and can only hope that future volunteers will continue with the behavior logging, brainstorming, and keeping everything up to date.
Anyway, aside from meal preparation and delivery, the bulk of every day was different and we decided each morning what needed to be done. There was of course the cleaning – sweeping under the metal cages in new quarantine that were raised above the ground as to enable to falling of debris, as well as removing the really old plants and ything obviously coated in poop or old food. We did a weekly deep cleaning of each area, using disinfectant and detergent to scrub the surfaces, collecting large ferns to create clean flooring, cutting down patuju stalks and various branches to freshen up their houses. The ferns were quite the challenge because most were covered in thorns, so we had to find ferns that were large enough but at the right maturity level that they wouldn’t prick us or the animals. My machete skills are definitely not top notch and it didn’t help that the blades were dull, so I usually preferred to take out the old plants while someone else chopped down the new. I wasn’t a fan of chopping down the jungle that surrounded us, bit by bit, but our animals didn’t have any live plants in their enclosures and it wasn’t fair at all to leave them with just bare metal cages and branches, or barren dirt grounds for those with slightly larger areas.
Apparently a month or two ago, quarantine was in even further neglect and no one did anything for them aside from basic feeding and cleaning, but very recently, volunteers began the improvement process. The enrichment that we did, both with hiding food and supplying fresh plants, was a huge step that should really be common sense in animal care, but there was no one to devote any time, energy, or passion to engage in this very significant but simple task. It’s all about the cats and while I am disappointed that I couldn’t work with a cat and probably would have gained more of an exciting and unique personal experience from that, I’m glad that I was able to put in work in an area where it was desperately needed. Aside from putting in natural forms of enrichment, I strung up hammocks out of blankets for two of our little monkeys – Lucas the squirrel monkey especially loved to bounce around in it from the moment I put it up.

Hola From The Jungle

Don´t have time for a real post - I´ve hardly been typing on my computer, and there isn´t a USB port on the computer here. Only a few computers in the town 5 minutes away and they are super slow and close early. I´m not working with cats because of a bunch of complicated things, but I´m working in quarantine, where animals are put when they first arrive or they are sick. Or they are stuck there when there is no other place for them to go. We have five monkeys, a coati, some birds, wild pigs (including an adorable baby), and an awesome coati. Very mixed experience (mostly with how the organization is run, etc.) there and we are actually only staying two weeks and then going on for a river tour and traveling around for the rest of the month, not sure yet where. Will probably type a bunch in a week on the bus ride up to Trinidad and should be online again on Friday or Saturday.

Santa Cruz De La Sierra

3pm
I’m sitting here at Parque El Arenal in Santa Cruz. The rushing waters of the fountain are dimmed by the noise of a worker welding together a part of the metal fence that surrounds this strange little park. There is a manmade lake with two tall fountains and a cement path around it filled with benches. There are actually quite a few people walking around the lake or sitting on the benches, most of them couples. In the middle of the lake, there is a cement island with some trees and greenery, but mostly filled with construction items. Like most places in Santa Cruz, it’s pretty run down with peeling paint, graffiti, and just doesn’t have the appearance that it is maintained.
Appearance-wise, I think Santa Cruz is the ugliest city that I’ve been in. The sky is finally blue right now, but yesterday was grey and humid and this morning was pretty gloomy as well. Although there are actually garbage cans around and therefore much less litter on the streets, most of the buildings are old and dirty. There are plenty of trees planted around the city, but it doesn’t have the natural surrounding beauty that I’ve seen in so many other places. It reminds me a bit of Lima, another city that in its move towards modernization, has left behind its cultural upkeep and just raced towards becoming much more commercial and westernized. Walking down the streets in the central area, there are mostly large stores with neat displays like I would find back home, some individual and some in towering malls. There are also the streets filled with salons or jewelry sellers, but it is all much more upscale than I’ve seen elsewhere. Cochabamba was also a bit like this, but I didn’t spend enough time there to get a real sense of the city. It’s really strange not to have a central market in which to wander, and it’s much harder to find vendors on the street or in the plaza. In Sucre, I was so used to buying ice cream on the street for 2 or 3Bs, but here it’s rare to find a vendor pushing around an ice cream cart – there are ice cream parlors everywhere that cost 3-4 times what they would elsewhere. Last night, everyone was walking around with a Styrofoam container filled with a massive amount of ice cream. I later discovered that it was half price on Tuesdays at one shop and there were mobs of people surrounding it, waiting with their tickets for quite a while for their delicacies to be prepared. The streets are crowded with micros, taxis, and private cars. Some intersections have traffic lights, which as usual are just for cars, not people, as cars always have right of way on turns. Though I was amazed today when a taxi actually stopped and let me cross the street in front of him. Usually I just need to run across whenever there’s a moment without cars, or dodge between them as they are stopped in traffic, often having to wait wedged between cars until I can pass another few meters. It’s become quite a habit to just cross wherever – there are sometimes crosswalks, but there are less cars in the middle of the street than at the intersection, so that’s where it is easiest to cross.
Santa Cruz has by far been the easiest city to navigate. Maybe I’m getting a better sense of direction, but it definitely helps that there are actually street signs on almost every corner. In other cities, if there are signs at all, the street name is painted on maybe on of the four corners so that you can only see it from certain angles. Usually, though, there is nothing on a corner and the only way to tell where you are is to find a building that has its address on a tiny placard above the door. Though most of the time, locals just know, so I would sometimes have to walk a block or two to figure out what intersection I was near. There also aren’t any hills here and the main part of the city is in an easily navigable grid. I think this is the first city that I actually know which direction is which on the map; I haven’t got lost once! Outside of the central area, the city branches out in numbered anillos (rings) and radiales (spokes) that connect the rings. Because the city has been developing so fast, I’ve done a bunch of useless wandering. My Lonely Planet guidebook is usually awesome at telling me where places are and how much things cost. It was written a year ago, but is way out of date for Santa Cruz. I go to a place where something is supposed to be, and it’s either moved or doesn’t exist anymore – that must have happened at least four times today!
Though Santa Cruz certainly isn’t the most attractive, it does have an interesting cultural environment to take in. Yesterday was a yet another holiday so aside from internet cafes and some restaurants, everything was closed. There were tons of people at these two giant café/restaurant/ice cream shops – Picolo and Dumbo’s. Both are huge buildings with balloons, countless staff, and people lounging for hours in large groups. The furniture was all brightly colored and the chairs were those interestingly shaped plastic kind. The sides of the cafes are lined with displays of endless baked goods and ice cream. Both of them have kids’ areas with plastic balls to jump in and colorful jungle gyms to climb all over. Those who weren’t at these family party places were spending their holiday afternoons at the central plaza – it was exploding with people sitting on benches - families, young and old couples, groups of friends. Kids run around and play while others relax with their coffee and cigarettes. There aren’t the typical vendors that I’ve always seen in plazas elsewhere, but there are old men pushing around carts filled with thermoses. Everyone buys little Styrofoam cups that he fills mostly with boiling hot milk to which he adds a shot of sweetened espresso. There’s a statue in the middle of the big plaza and tall trees all throughout. It is edged with the typical green shoe-shining stations. Near the towering church is an area with less trees where all of the pigeons congregate, chattering away as they walk and fly amongst the people. Most people seem to spend a good deal of their time just sitting and talking in the plaza – it’s always hard to find a spot on the bench, even though the park is filled with them. Life is very laid back in this bustling city, where the local pastime seems to be sitting outside or spending an afternoon at one of the many high end cafes. It’s an interesting experience to just sit amongst them and listen to the laughter and chattering around me.
Yesterday was the Aymara New Year, which occurs every year on the winter solstice. Very few crucenos (people of Santa Cruz) are of indigenous background – most Aymara people live on the other end of the country, and there were massive celebrations yesterday in the areas around La Paz, the biggest at the ruins of Tiwanaku. So here, I couldn’t find any festivities going on aside from people enjoying their days off of work (paid for all who work in any sort of official business). Walking the streets, I’ve encountered very few people in traditional dress, and those who I found were very impoverished, sitting on the sidewalks with their children, begging for money. At least in the central part of the city, there is very little poverty, though that which exists is very striking in contrast to the richer life that abounds. I’ve seen countless locals here with light skin, something that was very uncommon elsewhere in Bolivia aside from Cochabamba. Most everyone is dressed in modern clothing, carrying around fancy cell phones and digital cameras. Women walk in their high strappy shoes and boys are decked out with shiny tennis shoes and headphones. Children are pushed in strollers or carried in their mothers’ arms rather than strapped on their backs. It’s very clearly a city that is taking on ways of the western world, though it is unfortunately leaving a lot of its culture behind. Unlike everywhere else I’ve been, there’s no central market – there is a small Mercado on the outskirts of the city, but it’s not where everyone goes to do all their shopping – there are malls and grocery stores instead. It’s much harder here to find traditional meals, though the international cuisine is plentiful and supposed to be quite good (and expensive). For lunch, I found a vegetarian buffet with some pretty good options, though it charged by the kilo so I had to be very careful how much I put on my plate! For an early dinner, I went to a bakery that smelled absolutely amazing and everything looked so good – I had the person working there choose four of her favorite things for me. Wrapped in a banana leaf was a banana, yucca, and cheese delicacy, and there was a huminta with cheese and corn in a tamale leaf. Also had a little empanada of cheese, onions, and garlic, and a little cinnamon bun. Smelled so good, but there was nowhere to sit there and bask in the smell. Lucky people who work there! One of my favorite other pastries that they have around here is a cunape, which is doughy with cheese and some form of starch, slightly different each time – they are amazing when they are warm.
As one heads away from the city towards the surrounding jungle areas, there still exist colonial religious areas including a chain of Jesuit mission towns, as well as Amazonian communities. But in central Santa Cruz, that all seems to be washed away by the race towards modern ways of life. As I took the micro to the bus terminal on the outskirts of the city to get things figured out for our departure tomorrow, we definitely passed by areas that I was more used to seeing – frequent tiendas selling your basic home and food supplies, stalls of miscellaneous electronics, dustier people with more worn out clothes – an entirely different environment. In Sucre, old and new were perfectly blended together, but here, they are so much more distinctly apart. Nevertheless, it’s fascinating to walk around and watch the city and its developing culture pass me by.
There’s really not much to do here aside from stroll the streets, relax in the plaza, and eat. I went to one small museum this morning describing one Amazonian culture, and I’ll go to another this afternoon. Washed all my clothes in preparation for the jungle and I’m getting all of my electronics charged because it’s time for a month with no electricity, except for the occasional trip into town. Tomorrow I’m going to meet Tessa at the airport and then take two micros to the terminal, where we will take a bus for five hours to the town of Guarayos, and then catch another bus to reach the park. It looks like we may not be able to work with cats because there is a waiting list right now, so it may be monkeys and other smaller animals for us, and I’m also going to try to work a bit with the park vet. Though fingers crossed that I will still get a bit of interaction with some of the cats; I really want to go swimming with a puma!

Horse, Bus, and Plane

6/21
Since my Uyuni tour was a day less than I had planned, I was going to spend two days in Tupiza and maybe even do an overnight horseback riding trip, staying the night in a little town. But there were rumors that there would be another bus strike on Monday and I couldn’t risk that when I needed to be in a town 8 hours away to catch my flight Tuesday morning. I was worried that the bus wouldn’t even run overnight/the strike would start after midnight Sunday night, so I got up early Sunday morning to find out. At the bus terminal, I was assured that there would still be night buses, so booked for an 8pm to Tarija. It was hard to find an open agency to book my horse since it was Sunday, but I eventually found one and scheduled a five hour ride starting at noon. There were not many tourists around and probably due to different skills levels and ride lengths, they booked every ride individually or by groups that came together. So including tip, I paid about 20 USD for a private five hour ride. 
I had a few hours until my ride started, so I wandered around the tiny town. It was probably the smallest developed town that I’ve been to that hasn’t been completely tourist based. Got a bit confused navigating the city at times because street signs are almost never posted so I have to go by landmarks that I find in my guidebook – I walk one direction to find out if that is the way I want to go, and if not, it’s only a short distance to go the right way. There wasn’t any sightseeing to do in the town, but I spent time exploring the markets, passing by the same vendors multiple times as I circled around and found my way. Every city has a central market with a bread section, produce, rows of meat, and stalls with cheap meals, though usually meat. There is also usually a black market that has rows of electronics, personal and household supplies, clothing, homemade and fancier shoes, toys, and other random things. The markets in each city or town all have the same items but a different feel. The lowlands, highlands, north and south of the country – each area has a unique style of dress, a different indigenous population, different standards and ways of living. Hard to describe all of this but very interesting to experience as I encounter these markets everywhere I go.
A bit before noon, I collected my things from my hostel and headed over to the tour agency, where I was able to leave all of my belongings for the day. My guide came to pick me up and we walked a couple blocks to catch a micro to where the horses were kept. Luis was eighteen and finishing up high school. When he wasn’t in school, he worked constantly with the horses and hoped to go to the veterinary school in Tupiza to become a horse veterinarian. I really wish I could have talked to him more, but I had no voice at all and my throat hurt quite a bit. Riding probably wasn’t the best thing to do to get better, but I was there and I’d planned to ride here since before I came, so it was going to happen. I talked at times in a whisper, but it’s hard to have a conversation that way, especially when it is windy and you are on a horse. So most of the ride passed without talk, but there was plenty around to hear and see.
When we got to the stable, a few people were finishing nailing shoes onto my horse and wrapping his hocks with a blue bandage material. Apparently he has the tendency to kick rocks at himself as he walks, so they always wrap him before a ride. There were a good number of other horses roaming freely in a large pasture. As I waited, I played with a tiny pup who must have only been a few weeks old, her mother watching closely as I held her and then grooming her intensively once I put her back down. My horse, Terrible, was tall and brown with a blonde mane and was definitely one of the better looking horses that I saw during the day. Luis rode a shorter white horse. I made sure when I signed up for the tour to ask for a fast horse and say that I had riding experience, and although I definitely ended up with a stubborn horse, he was good to ride. As we made our way out of the corral area, Terrible decided that he didn’t want to leave and started running back into the pasture, ignoring my pulls on the reins. Great start! But once we got him out of there and onto the main road, he was mostly cooperative, though had a strong personality. The first part of the ride was directly along the railroad, walking in the middle of the tracks. Terrible knew the route so I didn’t guide him much, but was able to observe my surroundings and take pictures. I got to ride in front and set the pace, Luis following behind me, so there was no horse butt in front of me, just the vast surroundings. After turning off the railroad tracks, we followed a red dirt road up and over the mountains, exposing a gorgeous red countryside with scattered cacti and other greenery. Chirping of the birds, sighing of the horses, the steady clip clop of their walks, and the strong whooshing of the wind surrounded us, but there was no hint of any form of civilization. The horses walked and trotted most of the time, the road very rocky beneath their feet. Without a voice, I had a hard time imitating the sounds that Luis made to speed up the horses and Terrible didn’t respond well to kicks to his flank, so I had to rely on Luis to tell the horses when to speed up. There were several times when we galloped and cantered through the countryside, barely missing the cacti along the sides of the path, moving against the strong wind and pulling up dust, racing through the gorgeous surroundings. There was no horn on the saddle so it was harder than usual to maintain my balance, but I managed and loved when we sped through the changing landscapes, and Terrible seemed to enjoy the frolics as well. We descended down into an amazing red canyon, flanked by tall walls on all sides, and galloped on through a narrow passageway between rocks as we approached the depths of the canyon . The horses rested as I walked around and snapped pictures, the scenery changing as the clouds raced by and the sun hid and emerged again from behind large rocks as the afternoon made its way into evening. Even with my sunglasses, the views in some directions were only dark silhouettes of towering peaks of the canyon, whereas others were brightly colored with the contrast of red and green, backed by fluffy white clouds and the bright blue sky. I tried to get pictures with Terrible in the forefront, but he was very camera shy and it was hard to get a good shot. During the afternoon, we rode to several canyons, a formation known as the door of the devil, and an area with rocks that looked like figures of men. As the sun began to lower, we rode back along the railroad tracks. At one point, Luis stopped to talk to someone and told me to continue along, but Terrible froze after a little bit, refusing to walk until the other horse caught up. I dismounted a few blocks away from the central area and Luis walked the two horses back to their corral.
My bus to Tarija was my second night bus in a row, arriving at my destination again at 4am. It was a comfortable, quiet ride and I actually managed to get a little bit of sleep, though not enough given that I was trying to recover from a lost voice and a sore throat. Tarija was a much bigger city than Tupiza and actually had street signs, which was very exciting. Being near the border, it had a strong Argentine influence in the style of its plaza, churches, and other buildings. Both mornings there, I got breakfast at the Mercado Central. There was a row of women with their stoves, all trying to grab the people walking by to dine at their stall. The traditional fare is api (a delicious, steaming hot spiced purple corn drink) and pasteles (fried dough) either filled with cheese or topped with syrup and powdered sugar. Also got some Argentine pastries from the bakery section of the market, and of course I can never resist the fresh juice section. I wandered a bit around the markets and went to one museum that had some cool fossils of large animals from the region including a giant ground sloth the size of an elephant and a huge armadillo-like creature. All throughout the day, there was some sort of religious celebration based from one of the schools – I constantly heard music and saw people parading around with blue and silver décor. Tarija was another very quiet and laid back town with many modern stores, though it still had a traditional feel to it. Finding food that I could eat was quite difficult because given the proximity to Argentina, meat was a huge thing – finally had to settle on yet another pizza. It was strangely difficult to find an internet café, which are usually on every corner – I finally ran across a street filled with a row of them, all of which were stuffed with teenagers playing computer games or browsing facebook. I didn’t see another tourist during my day there. Tarija is renowned for its nearby wine country and is the base point for trips there, but it’s mostly just a passing through point and not much of a tourist attraction. But it was really nice to be away from the bustle of tourists and just see the town as it was, Argentine flavor throughout.
After a breakfast at the market the next morning, I took a taxi to the airport. I got dropped off outside the airport and paid half as much as I would have had he driven me the extra 100 meters inside the entrance of the tiny place. I got there a little over an hour early and I was the only passenger so far; had to wait another half hour go through security, which took less than a minute and I didn’t have to take off my shoes or jacket or remove my liquids or electronics! It was so much more relaxed than a US airport – no annoying security announcements or massive crowds of hurried people. There was actually wifi there, so easily passed the time before my flight. Just a few minutes after we lifted off, they told us that we could use portable electronic devices; we usually have to wait to 10,000 feet to do this! I took the cheapest Bolivian airline but it was so much nicer than most flights in the US. For an hour flight, they gave us a drink plus a refill as well as a little snack box – a muffin and a meat empanada on my first flight, and a pastry filled with dulce de leche and a cheese empanada on the second. We landed in Cochabamba, took the stairs off the plane and into the airport, and went through security again. It was very different from the place that I had come – there were businesspeople with their briefcases and laptops, fancy purses and sunglasses. The wifi at the airport wasn’t free, and all of the little cafes were much pricier. This airport had four gates rather than two, and had quite impressive architecture inside. After an hour of waiting, we walked back outside and boarded the same plane on which I had arrived. It was a short flight to Santa Cruz and we actually got off the plane through a gate and walked through the airport without going outside. Luckily getting my luggage was no problem. Oh, I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned it, but my zipper on my backpack broke yet again during my Uyuni trip and at this point I won’t be using my backpack too much more, so I’m just going around with safety pins and a buckle and it’s survived so far with that. Outside, I was very surprised by the sticky warm air of Santa Cruz and spent my first day in a long time without a jacket. Taxis from the airport were ridiculously expensive, but there were nice buses that headed towards the center. I got to sit in the front seat and have my big pack next to me, and the driver told me where to get off to walk a few blocks to my hostel. My voice was slowly coming back in croaks, but my ears were a complete mess from the two flights and it was hard to hear for quite a while. By later in the day, though, I could both speak and hear again, very exciting!

Indescribable Landscapes

6/20/11 4:20am
I’m sitting here at the station after a night bus to Tarija, waiting for it to get a little later so I can check in to a hostel without having to pay an extra night. My ears are popping from all this altitude change – though now I’m under 2000m and will be around this level for the rest of my trip. Tons and tons to catch up on from the last few days.
Given my good luck with buses, the trip from Potosi to Uyuni on Wednesday was of course an adventure. I was told the bus would leave at 10 sharp, but at 10, there was no bus in the designated spot. It finally pulled up and we all piled in and left around 10:30. Okay, not too bad yet, that was to be expected. About an hour in, we stop for half an hour or so as the driver fixes a flat time, and then on we go. But another hour later, we just stop cold and most of the locals get out, so we follow. The only foreigners on our bus were a couple from Holland and Oliver from Germany who was also ultimately heading for Tupiza. We sat outside in the middle of nowhere – a very pretty middle of nowhere, but still, it was a bit stressful having no idea how long we would be sitting there since we were apparently waiting for something. The driver said we were waiting for another bus to switch to, but a very angry woman ranted to me that we were just waiting for someone to bring something to repair the bus and it would take longer still. After waiting an hour with no solid word on what was going on, us travelers pretty stressed out and the locals just lounging around like this is an every day occurrence, another travel bus that was pretty empty pulled up. We ran up to it and asked them if we could get on, and then ran back and tried to get our driver to get our bags down from the roof. He was quite angry about it and resisted, but eventually threw them down at us with a scowl and we made our way over to the other bus. We had to pay a large portion of the bus ticket all over again, but it was worth knowing that we would actually get to Uyuni – we needed to get there before too late in order to book tours to leave the next morning. The new bus was much faster and sturdier and we got to Uyuni much earlier than we expected – the ideal trip would take six hours, but even with all of our mishaps, we got there in seven.
Picking a tour agency is tricky because every random company from the street tries to grab you and engage you in conversation and get you on their trip. But there are so many horror stories about Uyuni trips gone wrong with awful cars, drunk or crazy drivers, bad food, skipping out on promised places to visit, too many passengers, etc. Oliver and I wanted to find a four day trip that left us in Tupiza, but those don’t seem to exist unless you can get the group of four to six people to yourselves, so it was to be Uyuni back to Uyuni and then a night bus to Tupiza. We checked out a couple of the agencies that we had heard good things about and settled on one, Emprexsa. They told us that we would be with some people who were arriving from La Paz in the morning. But when we waited outside the following morning after a nice but expensive breakfast, the office was closed and there was no site of the owner for quite a while after the designated meeting time. So typical here, but still not used to it. Eventually she showed up, and then a nice shiny black jeep pulled up and we got in. We picked up Jung (Korea) from another agency down the block, and then Steven (Belgium), Mike (US), and Juergen (Germany) from a third agency, Red Planet. It seems our La Paz people didn’t show up or something so they loaded us on with Red Planet, but we got really lucky and that agency was a good one.
The six of us and our driver/guide/book Faustino piled into the jeep and set off first towards the train cemetery. I had purposefully not looked at many pictures of the trip beforehand, so the scenery never stopped amazing me. The train cemetery was old, dusty, windy, and rusty, but was filled with abandoned old cargo trains that had never been upkept. After the station was abandoned, people ransacked it and took parts of trains and knocked over others. With the weather, the trains are now merely red and brown metal skeletons, but it was still a really cool sight. I of course needed to climb up on whatever challenging parts I could find, and it was fun to walk across the top of the train and see endless train skeletons and desert in the distance. Getting down was always harder than up and took some creativity, especially with my short legs, but it was worth it. A bit like metal rock climbing, needing to find grips for your hands and feet and use arm strength to pull yourself up at certain points while dangling below.
Back in the jeep, it was then on to the little town of Colchani on the outskirts of the Salar where they process salt. They were selling tourist goods made entirely of salt, and we got out first glimpses of the expansive white fields with lined up piles of scooped packed salt ready to be loaded into a big truck and taken for processing. Then into the Salar we drove, stopping to play a bit where workers were busy making salt piles. It was such a strange experience to see the white-covered group and expect it to be wet, slippery, and cold like snow, but it was none of the above, just salt. One of thje best things about the Salar is that you can take some really amazing pictures because of the endless white into the horizon. You can play around with perspective and the angle of the camera and have jumping pictures look like you are flying, have someone who is behind some else look like they are being eaten or stomped on, make people really small in compared to objects, etc. We were really lucky to have Juergen, a professional photographer, in our group, so got some extra amazing pictures. Which the computer won´t let me upload right now! It took quite a bit of thought to figure out how to get the perspective right to get the photo we wanted, and it would have taken me a ton longer. There are endless kinds of photos you can take on the Salar, and I wished I had brought along a dinosaur figure and things of the sort, but we made do and got some really cool pictures regardless. After taking in the salt pile scenery for a bit, we had to move along to the salt hotel for lunch. The food was pretty good through the entire trip and I always got a decent substitution for my vegetarian option. We ate inside a building made entirely (except the roof) from bricks of salt. The chairs and tables were salt as well, covered with cloths and cushions. There was a little museum in back with more salt furniture, a salt bedroom, and large salt animal figures.
Then it was on to Isla Incahuasi, a really strange phenomenon to take in. Forever in the distance were white flats of salt, but there was an island in the middle full of cacti and hardened corals. Over one thousand years ago, this entire area used to be under water (and the salt planes are still under water during the rainy season), but there is now a rocky desert in the middle of the salt. With the chilly air and endless white scenery, it really feels like you are in the snow, so it’s quite the odd and confusing to see “snow” and cacti side by side. It was getting late in the day, so we just had a little over the hour to hike the island and then move down to take pictures in the endless white, the perspective undisturbed by any piles of snow or working trucks. We played more with our cameras in the salt until we were dragged off so that we would see the sunset over the water and arrive at the hostel before dark. From the car, we could tell that the salt on which we drove was segmented into perfect hexagons and other shapes, caused by a relationship between the sun drying up water between the cracks and the pressure of the salt lake underneath.
As evening begin to descend, we drove into the water-filled part of the planes. During the summer/rainy season, the entire Salar is covered in water, and at this point, we get the best of both worlds with much of it dried out but still a large portion remaining a shallow lake. We drove on through the lake, watching the waves that we and the other jeeps created. There was an incredible sunset over the lake and at one point there was a salt dune where we were able to get out, take pictures, and try not to freeze while taking in this indescribable site, so different than a typical sunset over a lake with the knowledge that this was all salt.
The day nearing its end, we headed to our salt hostel for the night, another building with practically everything (though thankfully not the mattresses) made of salt. We warmed up with tea and cookies before dinner. Outside, the near full moon rose surrounded by a circle of clouds that it dyed a bright yellow – a very nice sight to eat dinner to! After the electricity went out at 9, the only illumination for miles was from this bright yellow moon.
We got up in the morning to breakfast with a gorgeous sunrise over the Salar, and then headed out for the day. It was sad to leave the Salar, where I could have easily spent a lot more time, but there were many more things to come. We drove off into an endless desert, stopping to take in the scenery and take pictures at a set of abandoned railroad tracks. In the horizon were snow-capped mountains and volcanoes of both Bolivia and Chile. We stopped again at an area with volcanic rock formations amidst their astounding background. In the distance, we could see smoke emerging from a semi-active volcano. It was near silent out here aside from the sounds of our footsteps on the rocky ground and the constant clicks of our cameras.
Next came a series of lakes, each appearing after we rounded another bend. They smelled of sulfur, which must have been rundown from nearby volcanoes. Many of the lakes were surrounded in white material, which Faustino told us was calcium carbonate. There were occasionally tiny settlements near the mountains where people used to collect sulfur, but the price is almost nothing now so they have abandoned the practice, leaving one person there as a caretaker of the equipment and facilities. The most fascinating and unique lake was Laguna Colorado. The waters are red from the presence of red algae and other bioorganisms. During the wet season, thousands of flamingos inhabit the lake, but migrate during the summer to Chile or to the more tropical regions around Cochabamba within Bolivia. The older flamingos, however, stay year round, as it is too much for them to migrate. The lake is filled with toxic chemicals including sulfur and arsenic from the surrounding mountains, but the flamingos are able to use their breaks in a manner to filter out the toxins and only take in the delicious algae, thus maintaining their bright colors. So we saw a good number of flamingos but could only imagine what it looks like flooded with flamingos in January and February. In contrast with the strange red water of the lake were yellow banks, brown hills, and distant snow-capped mountains. Fluffy clouds scattered the sky throughout the day and were a really nice addition to the scenery. They would race through the bright blue sky, changing shape, as their corresponding shadows sped alongside the mountains. As we drove through the changing landscapes, we could sometimes see the huge dust clouds created by nearby jeeps as well as our own, and sometimes we were the only car, nothing in the distance but vast desert, the only sign of life being old tire tracks. At the highest points in these open deserts live only vicunas (part of the llama family, but so petite and graceful that I at first thought they were antelope), a chinchilla-like creature, and flamingos. Further down in the altiplano there are llamas, sheep, and other animals that you would expect to see, but it was fairly desolate at 4000m plus.
We also went to the Pierdra de Arbol, a formation of volcanic rocks where the most famous rock resembles a tree. The tree was impressive, but more so was the collection of volcanic rocks that surrounded it. It was late in the afternoon and the wind was insane, sand blowing everything, so it was quite the environment. I of course climbed to the top of one of the rocks and stood at the top, but was practically tipped over by the wind and had to use all my strength to maintain standing. My eyes were streaming in tears from the bitter cold wind, and I had to hold tightly to my hat and scarf, which the wind constantly tried to snatch away. A nose muff would have been perfect, but I unfortunately didn’t have any clown noses in the car. We eventually climbed back into the warm jeep, frozen but exhilarated. This set of volcanic rocks is very weak and brittle. In the early morning, the rocks are very cold, but heat up and become malleable midday. With the strong winds of the early evenings, bits and pieces of the rocks are constantly eroded away, so this landscape will eventually disappear bit by bit.
We hid inside at our next hostel, seeking shelter from the cold strong winds and swirls of dust. After our tea and cookies, we played cards until dinner, which was pretty basic spaghetti but finished with a good bottle of wine from Tarija in place of dessert. My zipper luck continues and just as I was about to go to bed, the zipper that had been fixed on my big pack broke again and I was unable to get it back on the track. So back to safety pins and a buckle it was, and at this point I’m just going to leave it be since I won’t be moving around very much anymore and this is becoming too much of a pain.
All night long, there was pattering on the metal roof. We were supposed to get up at 5:30 to begin our journey and eat breakfast later on, but we got knocks on our doors at 5:20 saying that it was snowing and way too windy and dark to go out yet, so we would eat breakfast at the hostel at 6. It was a little lighter by the time we left, but there was still a constant swirl of white and it was hard to see more than a few feet in front of the car, let alone which direction the road even curved. Luckily our guide was a very good driver, though scared us quite a few times as he drove quickly through the white abyss. We were going to visit the geysers, but as we passed the turnoff at 4900m, it was clear that there was no way we would be able to see anything, so we had to skip that bit. We continued on to a lake with hot springs. The strong winds and intense snow had stopped, but it was still cold to go into the bath knowing that we would have to get out of it again – some other groups did, but none of us went for it. This was my first ever snowstorm, so although I was disappointed to miss the geysers and hot springs, it was definitely an adventure clinging to the seats as we hoped that Faustino knew what he was doing. Standing outside, I was really excited by the snowflakes that fell on me – I don’t think I’ve been in anything more than a snow flurry where the flakes disappear right away, but these stayed on my clothes, shaped in perfect geometrical patterns as if cut out from paper and shrunk down.
There had been uncertainty about whether we would be able to drop off people in Chile or not, if the border would be open given the weather, but we eventually sent Jung, who was going to Chile, with another group and took an Australia from that jeep back to Uyuni with us. The third day was the least exciting of the three, and I wish they had spread out the main sites better, or saved the Salar for the last day, which can only be done if no one in the group needs to be dropped off at the Chilean border. We spent most of the day just driving, which was gorgeous but got more tiring than the other days because there were less things to see that were unique and completely breathtaking. We had been near 5000 meters and watched the landscape change drastically as we moved away from the high lakes and vast deserts with scarce greenish shrubbery. In the altiplano, the fields got greener and more towns appeared, most of them based in quinoa harvest, though the fields are currently empty due to the season. We stopped on the way at a few more sights, my favorite being another huge formation of volcanic rocks onto which I climbed way up, finding shelter from the wind between two nearby layers.
I had much more to write during the trip but nothing else is coming out right now, though I guess this is quite long as it is. Back in Uyuni, I got dinner with the guys and then Oliver and I began our journey to Tupiza. We had bought our bus ticket earlier but once we got to the station, we were told that we were moved to another company because their bus wasn’t running that night. After a complicated mess of things, I went back to the ticket lady to sort something our, leaving all of my bags on the sidewalk with Oliver. Suddenly saw the bus drive away and even though it was way before it was time for the bus to leave, this scared me quite a bit and I ran after it until I saw Oliver giving a thumbs up through the window. The bus was just making a u-turn and going to a different spot. Definitely not a fun experience, especially with having to break into a sudden sprint at that altitude! The bus ride was uncomfortable and shaky because the road was so awful. They squeezed people into the aisles. At least I had a seat, but it got partially taken over at times. There was a young woman with her baby sitting in the aisle next to me, and her husband sat in front of her on some sack (which is very rare to see a guy traveling with or even helping a young mother). The baby was adorable, hardly crying, just looking around with a constant giddy look on her face, her mouth open in joy over every little thing. I fell asleep on and off, and woke up once to find the dad had wedged his feet into what little room my feet weren’t using in front of me, and the mom was sitting on my armrest and taking up a good amount of my chair with her back. Squished! We eventually got to Tupiza at 4am and decided to get a hostel for a few hours to get a little bit of sleep. Tupiza details later, it’s late enough now to go find a place in Tarija.
Oh, at some point during this whole adventure, I lost my voice, and it´s still gone. Not good..