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This part of my Cerritos College web is devoted to my travel in South America in 2004-2005 while on sabbatical leave. The general purpose of my leave was straightforward: to improve the quality and add to the value of Geographic instruction offered by me to the students of Cerritos College. My sabbatical leave included travel, research, and the development of instructional material. I visited the countries of Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru and Chile because that area of South America offers numerous possibilities for remarkable learning and teaching experiences that will benefit the quality of classroom instruction in all of my geography courses. My aim was to document contrasts in urban and rural locations and lifestyles. Also, to record contrasting natural and cultural traits throughout the areas that I visited. My wife, Maria, joined me during the first one-half of my journey. We began our travel in Ecuador. Cerritos College's Campus Connection recently featured our trip to South America. Use this link to read a short summary. Ecuador has an area of about 283,520 square kilometers. Its population is just over 13 million. The people of Ecuador are 40% mestizo (a blend of native and European), 40% Indian, 15% Spanish descent, and 5% African descent. The two dominant languages of Ecuador are Quechua and Spanish, and the country is over 90% Roman Catholic. Ecuador's capital is Quito with a population of about 1.6 million. While in Ecuador Maria and I visited Quito and Guayaquil, the two largest cities. We also visited several smaller pueblos on our way to the Equator and the Otavalo Market. In several ways, Maria and I were not all that impressed with Ecuador's largest cities. Perhaps we were expecting too much or unfairly comparing them to Spain's larger cities. The smaller pueblos however provided us with an opportunity to experience more of everyday life in Ecuador by actually visiting with the people while they worked in their shops. Our trips to the Equator and the Otavalo Market were packaged trips provided by small local tour companies. We don't usually enjoy such tours however we were able to see many things that were new to us and we learned a lot with both experiences. Here are some maps showing Ecuador's location and principle cities!
Starting here (and spread throughout the text) are links to photo galleries of pics from our travels in South America. The links can be found in the center of the page. Simply click once on the thumbnail to enlarge it, and click twice on your "back" button to return to the main South America page. We begin with Ecuador! Browse and ENJOY!! After a few days in Ecuador, Maria and I flew on to LaPaz, Bolivia where we had two families waiting to share host duties. Maria and I spent most of our time in La Paz in the home of Jorge and Debbie Calvimontes. It was certainly one of the highlights of our trip to meet and make such very special new friends. We also spent time at the home of Mari Carmen Arce. She and her children, along with her mother and her 100-year-old grandmother, live nearer to the center of La Paz than Jorge and Debbie which gave Maria and I a chance to see different parts of La Paz. Staying in their homes only added to the success, pleasure, and intrigue of our travel. Follow the link for some views of the Andes Mountains from 37,000 feet! Remember, it was Summer when we visited but look at the snow that remains at that altitude and the magnificent glacial features! Bolivia's area is about 1,098,581 square kilometers. It has a population of nearly 9.2 million. Bolivia's population is a curious blend of European migrants and Amerindians. There are two important groups of Amerindian natives, the Aymaras and the Quechuas. Together, they make up about 55% of Bolivia's population. The main languages spoken in Bolivia are: Spanish, Aymara, Quechua, and Guaraní. Bolivia is divided into 10 Departments. Bolivia actually has two federal capital cities. La Paz is the capital of the Department of La Paz and the seat of government for the nation's Executive and Legislative branches, while Sucre is the seat of the nation's Judicial branch and capital of the Department of Chuquisaca. Bolivia's other major cities include Santa Cruz, El Alto, and Cochabamba. These maps show Bolivia's location and cities!
Jorge, the brother-in-law of my friend Victor (who helped put the trip together) met Maria and I at the La Paz airport when we arrived. I didn't realize it at the time but Jorge would soon become a good friend and traveling companion. We spent the next day settling into the altitude of LaPaz (3,650 meters; about 11, 600 ft. above sea level) by visiting the city while we made travel arrangements for our trips to Chile and Peru. On Tuesday, December 21st Maria and I left La Paz for what started out as a 7 hour bus ride (about 517 kilometers distance) to the northern reaches of the world's driest desert, the Atacama, and the town of Arica. It was quite an adventure. At the Bolivian border check point we both noticed that one man (in his forties and traveling alone) was given special attention by the Bolivian police by not having to stand in line to present exit papers. Well, at the Chilean border check point that same man was caught by a drug sniffing dog with 4 kilos of cocaine packed into a false bottom of his travel bag. The Chilean police detained him, our bus and all of us for nearly 4 hours until they released the bus and us to continue our trip. Of course, the man ended up in a Chilean jail facing a mandatory minimum of 15 years of prison! We made it to Arica, finally (after nearly 11 hours), and there we spend two days visiting that city. Arica is an important Chilean port close to the Peruvian border. It is considered one of the gateways to the country. The Azapa Valley, which stretches inland from the city, is rich in agriculture. Arica's Azapa Valley has become one of the world's leading producers of olives. Arica was also the center of the millenary Chinchorro culture, whose mummies are among the oldest found in the world. In Arica, we mistakenly took the advice of our cab driver and ate a meal in a roadside restaurant only to get a very bad case of "The Revenge of the Incas". We returned to LaPaz to celebrate Navidad Bolivian style on the 23rd of December. In the afternoon of the 24th Victor and I visited a very surreal location on the south side of La Paz called the Valle de la Luna. This wind and water carved landscape is reminiscent of America's desert southwest and, it is said that aliens once landed there, believe that or not! After the Navidad on the 24th and 25th, Maria and I left by bus once more the morning of the 26th to Peru to visit Lake Titicaca, the Incan city/fortress of Machu Picchu and the modern Andean city of Cuzco. Chile has an area of about 748,000 square kilometers. It is a long, skinny nation. Political geographers refer to Chile as an "elongated" country. It has a population of nearly 15.4 million. Chile's population is also a curious blend of European migrants and Amerindians. Ninety-five percent of the population are said to be either white or white-Amerindian. Spanish is the main language spoken in Chile. Santiago (population 4.9 million) is Chile's capital. Chile's other major cities include Concepción, Viña del Mar, and Valparaiso. Peru's land area is about 1.3 million square kilometers and its population tops 27.5 million. This population is a mixture of Amerindian (45%), mestizo (37%), white (15%), and black, Japanese, Chinese, and others (3%). Peru is over 90% Roman Catholic and the major languages spoken are Spanish, Quechua and Aymara. There are also a large number of minor Amazonian languages spoken. Lima (population 7.4 million) is Peru's capital. Arequipa, Trujillo and Chiclayo are three other major Peruvian cities. The locations and major cities of Chile and Peru are shown are these next two sets of maps.
Whenever one leaves La Paz by bus you must travel up in altitude to and through the city of El Alto and out onto the Bolivian altiplano. And so we did as we began our trip to Peru. The altiplano (high plain) is truly a unique natural and cultural location. It is a vast area in size and averages about 12,000 feet above sea level in elevation. It is a sparsely populated region characterized by isolated farming and ranching villages of Quechua and Aymara natives. The homes are generally made of adobe and covered with tin or straw. The people grow hardy grain and tuber crops at this altitude where the climate is cold and dry. They also raise sheep, llamas and cattle. After some time traveling northwest from La Paz we found ourselves skirting the edges of Lago (Lake) Titicaca. At 12, 580 feet above sea level, it is the world's highest freshwater navigable lake. Lake Titicaca is nearly 8,500 square kilometers in area. It just seemed to stretch on for miles and miles as we began to approach the pueblo of Huatajata where we would cross the lake on our way to Copacabana, Puno, Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Lake Titicaca and Peru's Countryside Our time spent in Peru can best be described as electrifying. The towns are bustling with people, autos, and animals. The markets are alive with the noises, the sights and the smells of everyday commerce. Sightseeing and sleeping can be tough though until you acclimate to the altitude. Traveling from Puno to Cuzco gave us an opportunity to really see this part of the Peruvian countryside. Along the way we crossed a mountain pass at 14, 200 feet above sea level. The highest elevation Maria and I had ever experienced. This landscape is overflowing with terraced hillsides and irrigation canals used for agriculture, groves of fir trees along the mountain ridges, stone fences that surely must date way back in time, herds of sheep and llamas being tended by men and women of all ages, and awe inspiring mountain vistas. While in Cuzco we enjoyed walking through the narrow Spanish Colonial streets, eating wonderfully delicious local food, and visiting some of the many museums. We took day trips through small pueblos such as Chinchero (which has what may be one of the earliest Spanish Colonial Catholic churches built atop Incan stones) and to several nearby Incan ruins including the Valle Sagrado, Saqsaywaman, an Incan religious site where human sacrifices took place known as Q'enqo, Pukapukara, and, of course, Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu was/is everything we had hoped for. This fortress Incan city was built on a mountain peak overlooking the Rio Urubamba in a lush rain forest to control foot travel along the Incan Trail between the Amazon Basin and the city of Cuzco. It is mystical! The technology used in its construction, the systems of irrigation and terracing for agriculture and erosion control are simply unimaginable. There are rooms for priestly meditation and a ceremonial playing field which were built acoustically precise so that the slightest sounds are heard throughout the room or field. We ended our trip to Machu Picchu by having a great lunch along the banks of a tributary of the Rio Urubamba in a nice canteen in the town of Aguas Calientes. We left Cuzco for La Paz at 10:30 PM on Thursday, December 30th. Fourteen hours later we arrived back where we started, in La Paz! Maria and I spent New Year's Eve at the home of the parents of a gracious and influential woman we met through our friend Victor. Her name is Maria Vega. Her parents have a penthouse piso (the Spanish word for apartment) near a small but beautiful plaza and near the residence of the Ambassador to Bolivia from the United States. We had a wonderful dinner and ended the night with fireworks in the plaza. New Year's day was quite a cultural experience for both of us. Another Bolivian friend, Patty (who is Japanese-Bolivian and living not far from us in Cypress) has a sister, Kiko, still in Bolivia. We spent the day at her parents' home eating authentic and traditional Japanese food. Kiko's mother had cooked for two days in preparation for this traditional feast. There was enough food for the entire neighborhood, some of which I was somewhat skeptical of eating. It seemed odd at times not to be watching the Rose Parade and college football bowl games on January 1! Regardless, we had a wonderful time talking and sharing with these new friends. At this point in our journey it was time for Maria to return to America and for me to continue on my own! Maria was concerned for my ability to get along considering my limited Spanish language skills but I had plenty of help coming my way. On January 2nd Victor and I, along with Maria Vega, boarded a flight to Santa Cruz de la Sierra. This was a brief 60-minute flight east into Bolivia's savanna grasslands near the Amazon River basin. What a difference in climate! In Santa Cruz the humidity and temperature are just what you would expect in the tropics nearer to sea-level! What a dramatic change from La Paz! Santa Cruz is the capital of the Department of Santa Cruz in Bolivia. It was founded by the Spaniard Nuflo de Chaves in 1561 as Santa Cruz de la Sierra. Located some 550 km/342 mi southeast of La Paz, it is the second-largest city in the country having population estimated at 1.1 million (2004). The surrounding area is fertile, producing sugar cane, soybeans, cotton, rice, maize, and coffee. It is a hub of transport and trade. Newly discovered oil and natural gas has led to the city’s rapid development. This development has come with a price however. Much of the recent political turmoil in Bolivia is fueled by the jealousy between La Paz, the political power and Santa Cruz, the economic power. Neither of which it seems to me are too concerned to truly work out these differences. While in Santa Cruz we took daytrips to nearby agricultural and industrial areas. We visited small pueblos, and even experienced our first torrential tropical downpour of rain complete with flooded streets in which the children were playing! I was even interviewed by El Deber, reportedly Santa Cruz's largest newspaper. It seems the a member of Victor's family in Santa Cruz had the connections at the paper to arrange this. A short article appeared in the paper the following day detailing my impressions of Bolivia. Pretty cool, huh! |
Ms. Vega, Victor and I returned to La Paz on Wednesday, January 5th. Once back at Jorge and Debbie's I was able to speak with Maria while she made her way through the Miami airport. She was not a happy traveler at that time and I really wished then that I had been with her to help. Early the next day Victor and I returned to the La Paz airport for our flight to San Borja where we would join Jorge and his son Jorgito who had traveled there overland by bus. San Borja is where Jorge was born and raised, so Victor and I were really in for an adventure on Jorge's home turf when we landed on San Borja's dirt runway! San Borja is an timber logging and cattle ranching town of about 20,000 population on the fringes of the Amazon Rain Forest Basin in the Bolivian Department of Beni. It is hard for some of my friends and family to understand how geographers think about travel and discovery (even harder for some geographers!), but there I was in the Amazon Basin! Wow! To this point in my trip I had seen the Andes Mountains of Peru, the driest deserts of northern Chile and now the tropical jungles of eastern Bolivia! I was as excited as a child with a new bike for Christmas! Jorge's friends and family really went out of their way to make our time in San Borja interesting and informative. Meeting peoples of different cultures and coming to know them is such a wonderful way to learn more of the world around us. Bright and early on Friday, January 7th Victor, Jorge, and I were joined by Jorge's brother-in-law Manfred, a Boliviano of German ancestry and local building contractor. Manfred was about to take us on an adventure I won't soon forget. We traveled about seventy kilometers southwest of San Borja to the village of Carra Carra on the banks of the Rio Maniqui on the tribal lands of the Chimani Indians. Here Manfred (with tribal permission and aid from The World Bank) is building a road through Chimani lands to connect the river to the larger roads and trading regions outside of Chimani territory. The Chimani are a kind and simple agricultural people. There has not been too much contact (aside from Christian Missionaries) between the Chimani and the outside world over time and their culture and lifestyle remain intact as it has been for many, many years. I consider myself fortunate to have visited with these unique people.
There is not a lot to do in San Borja if you are not a logger or rancher. That is not altogether that bad I suppose! Those who are not, male or female, young or old go about their daily lives tending to their affairs in a very relaxed manner. For entertainment they spend their days and nights either in the town's plaza talking (perhaps gossiping?), sleeping in their hammocks, playing pool at the town's only pool hall, or riding motor bikes through the streets. It is a far cry from the fast-paced life you and I are accustomed to! I really enjoyed my brief time in Jorge's San Borja!
After getting some much needed rest at Jorge's home, the final episode of my travel throughout Bolivia began the morning of Monday, January 10th. Much to Maria's delight, Jorge had agreed to travel with me to the remaining cities I wanted to visit but, before that could happen, we had to get out of la Paz! Remember from earlier that the city of El Alto is located above La Paz so that when you leave La Paz you must travel through El Alto. Well, El Alto and La Paz were feuding at the time over water rights, utilities and other civic issues and demonstrations of civil unrest were blocking the airport and roads. That meant that most forms of transport had come to a halt! Jorge, however, with his determined spirit, decided that we should try to leave anyway. Here's the picture, we are on the bus (along with many others) waiting to leave the La Paz bus terminal when we were told that the bus would not leave the terminal full with passengers and risk our safety by running any possible blockades. So, we were all told to get off the bus, walk across the street from the terminal and wait there for the empty bus to come and pick us up! While waiting I watched with sorrow as an indigenous women picked through some of the day's street garbage. Jorge explained that she was gathering food for her pig! I could only pause and count my blessings! Anyway, one and one-half hours later...no bus! We returned to Jorge's home! We tried again the following night only to have the same thing happen and, well, by now I had had it as we waited once more by the roadside for the bus and I was ready to return to America that instant! A fellow passenger urged me to wait a bit longer and sure enough the bus did arrive and my adventure was finally underway! Starting the evening of Tuesday, January 11th (by bus and train) Jorge and I visited Oruro, Uyuni, Potosí, Sucre and Cochabamba in a short span of seven nights and six days returning to La Paz Monday evening January 17th. What a trip!
We arrived in Oruro at 8 AM on the 12th. The city of Oruro is the capital of the Department of Oruro. It has a population of about 200,000 and is located southeast of La Paz at an altitude of about 3,700 meters. After a great breakfast Jorge and I were met in the main plaza by an associate of Mari Carmen Arce. We spent the day walking the streets of Oruro while learning more about this 15th Century Bolivian city. Clearly, the highlight of my time in Oruro had to be my visit to one of the former mansions of Don Simón Iturri Patiño. Patiño, of poor mestizo background from Cochabamba, came to Oruro as a mining apprentice but by 1924 owned fifty percent of all Bolivian tin production and controlled the European refinement of Bolivian tin. He was certainly one of the world's wealthiest men of the time. His home in Oruro is now a museum and library operated by one of Oruro's universities. While in Oruro Jorge and I briefly toured one of Patiño's long-abandoned tin mines, The San Jose mine. This mine was closed by the Spanish during the colonial period but rediscovered in 1982 during construction to expand the Catholic church built above the abandoned mine by the Spanish era. We left Oruro at 7 PM by train and arrived in the town of Uyuni at 3 AM. Jorge and I found a hostel and crashed for the remainder of the night.
We awoke and were already planning our visit to the Salar de Uyuni by 8 AM. Uyuni and the Salar de Uyuni are located within the Department of Potosi, south of Oruro about 3,800 meters above sea level. The Salar de Uyuni is one of the world's most unique landscapes. It is a immense (12,000 square kilometers) ancient inland sea that became a closed basin nearly 10,000 years ago and since then has been steadily evaporating. The Salar de Uyuni is described as the world's largest playa. The inland basin is now fed by only one stream, The Rio Grande de Lipez. It is simply flat, flat and flat for as far as the eye can see. This vast drying lake bed is doted occasionally by outcroppings of rock that were once islands. The tour guides use these rock formations as landmarks for navigation. Geologically speaking, the Salar de Uyuni is described as a sequence of evaporates. The topmost layer, halite (salt) is said to be fifty-eight meters thick at the Salar's center and three meters thick at the edges. Under the halite are layers of potassium, lithium and boron. Along with six other tourists, Jorge and I set out for an exploration of this fascinating place. Our trip took us out onto the flatness of this evaporating lake bed. Our first stop was as the Hotel De Sal. This is a hotel make entirely of salt! Really! The beds, the tables and chairs, the exterior and interior walls, nearly everything! It was not a part of our tour that day but on occasions other travelers will spend the night at this unique little hotel. We then headed farther out into the expanse of flatness toward one of the outcroppings, The Isla de Pescado, where we would have our lunch and the vehicle would be made ready for the return trip. At one point during our ride I looked over past Jorge only to see our driver fast asleep at the wheel while we going about 25 MPH!! At first I was concerned and wanted to wake him but then I realized that there was nothing, absolutely nothing for him to hit here nearly in the middle of this measureless flatness. Soon, however, the other tourists noticed and woke our driver up! He didn't seem too concerned and I'll bet that was not his first driving siesta! We got back to the town of Uyuni pressed for time and hurriedly caught a bus for our next stop, Potosi. We arrived late in Potosí some six hours later, got a room at a hostel but mistakenly agreed to share a communal bath, took one look at the bath, said "later", went to our room and fell fast asleep still encrusted in salt from the Salar!