We arrived at Koala Den and realized that the entire rest of the backpackers that were on the bus also decided to stay there. We all lined up hoping that there would be enough rooms as the prospect of looking elsewhere wasn’t greatly appealing. However, this time luck was on our side – and there were rooms aplenty.
That afternoon we thought we would head out and explore...what we found we loved. The phrase don’t judge a book by its cover is so true in this situation. Although the outskirts of town did not look appealing at all, the centre of town was alive with spirit and had a huge fresh (South American “fresh”) fruit and veggie market. We ran around like little kids in a candy store, (after eating nothing but friggin soup, rice and chicken for the last week) grabbing at treats and that night made a super curry...our first home cooked meal in a while.
Potosi was pretty chilled for us, lots of relaxing and reading, Vasiles learning how to take hidden camera shots out of the side of a hole in his bag, and a heap of eating. Bolivia is incredibly cheap – we weren’t going anywhere near our daily budget and were living like KINGS!
Once the wealthiest city in South America, Potosi sits on mountains (once) filled with silver veins, and this made the city famous across the continent. The hills are riddled with mines, and obviously, this makes up a big part of the work for the local men. Unfortunately, these mines are filled with dangerous dusts – Asbestos and silica dust being the main ones, and so any extended period working in the mines had hugely damaging effects on the health of the workers. Most get sick after working the mine for 10 years, but most have no choice as it is the only source of income for their families. The miners work in a conglomerate – each mining their own ore and selling it to the conglomerate which then refines it and sells it on. This means the workers work their own hours, and often do 24hr shifts several times a week if the price of silver is good internationally.
They run trips down into the mines with a guide, and having heard this was an incredible once-in-a-lifetime experience, Vasiles and Doodles signed up and headed off after breakfast one morning to check them out. Boos Boos is super claustrophobic, and decided to sit this one out, and after hearing the boys stories – was glad she did!
The trip started with a stop at the miner markets, where each miner has to purchase their own tools, dynamite and safety gear – these aren’t provided by any company. It is customary to buy some gifts for the miners to take down, and thank them for allowing access to the mine for gringo touristicas like us. This market was SO cool. Doodles (after spending a grand total of $10 AUD, came out with the following shopping:
- 1 x Stick of Dynamite
- 1 x Bag of fertilizer to enhance the dynamite blast
- 1 x detonator
- 1 x bottle of 96% sugar cane liquor (more like metho!), as being a Friday, the miners drink this stuff during their shifts to “warm up” for Friday night festivities.
- 1 x 1kg bag of coca leaves + stick of bicarbonate ash stuff as coca catalyst.
- 2 x bottles of soft drink
The dynamite was to be either given to the miners or saved for after the mine trip, to blow up in the desert. The coca leaves – well we got started on them straight away, they are a great herbal tea, and most people living at altitude here chew them. You need to rip out the stems, put a big chunk in your mouth and chew with your molars, making a big green ball of leaves. Then you take a bite out of the ash (which is basically bicarb soda, but tastes pretty much like dry pastey fishness – not great honestly). This ash releases the active alkaloids in the leaf, (of which there are about 14 apparently – don’t worry mum and dad – only one of these in the cocaine alkaloid) which quickly turns your mouth numb, gets rid of any headache and gives you a little boost of energy – very similar to having a coffee. It’s also very common as a tea, and they use it for a bunch of different herbal remedies. There is a lot of anger about the U.S anti drug programs coming into Bolivia and destroying all of the crops, as there is a large local market for the leaf, none of which are for cocaine production.
ANYWAY, back to the shopping – this liquor is DEADLY stuff. For some reason, once we were in the mines, and the guide found out I was Australian, he thought it was a great idea to keep giving me sips of the terrible stuff… I have to say, at 96%, I was feeling boozed by the end, and we were pretty sure he was hammered…
There was about 7 of us in the group, and for me being the tallest and fattest, I was bent almost double most of the way. The tunnels vary greatly in size, as some of them were made in colonial times when money was flowing, and so are large and easy to navigate. Others, which we got to close to the end of the trip, were the size of my body, so I was laying on my stomach pulling myself along with my hands, and my back was touching the roof! Funnily enough (or maybe it was the sugar cane booze), but after feeling apprehensive beforehand, once we were in the tunnels, you just seem to focus on going straight ahead, and not on being so deep under the earth.
These mines though, are just insane. It gets up to about 45 degrees Celsius down there, and they remove the ore by one of 3 ways. Firstly some carry it on their back in a hessian sack – each carrying about 40kg on their back as they climb up ladders and through these tunnels. The second way is with little wheelbarrows, where the miner runs along bent double pushing the barrow with about 100kg in it. The last way is the most common from films etc, with the mine cart, which when loaded weighs about 2 tons. 4 miners fill the cart, then alternate dragging and pushing it up to another level, on tracks, when it is unloaded into hessian bags and then winched to the surface.
After about 3 hrs, bashing my head/back/everything, sweating like crazy and getting harder and harder to breath – we were well and truly ready for the exit, and when it came it was so very sweet! While we chilled out and enjoyed the cool fresh air, our guide grabbed our dynamite and proceeded to make up a bunch of bombs, light them up, and then pass them round for 1 min 30 seconds of photographic gold! Shortly after, a 14yr old Bolivian kid grabs the bombs, and runs like crazy into a bare patch of ground before high tailing it out of there before they blow the S*@t out of him. I hadn’t seen dynamite go off before, and wow, what a way to see it.
After 5hrs of sweating, climbing, drinking and chewing coca leaves. We were understandably looking and smelling incredible when we arrived back to the hostel, much to Boos Boos’s pleasure! My mouth was totally green from the leaves, so it was a hot sight!
This was one of the most amazing experiences I have had, and definitely gave another definition to the OH&S lessons I learnt back in Industrial Chem days… Bolivia doesn’t know what OH&S is! And it rocks!
The following day we jumped on another incredibly safe bus, bound for our next stop north – the apparently beautiful town of Sucre. See you there!
Peace and Love
Doodles and Boos Boos
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