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| Home of ruins much older than Machu Picchu |
Friday May 10,
2013: La Paz/Tiahuanaco Ruins
I was up early so I could get breakfast before leaving on my
day tour to the ancient Tiahuanacan Ruins. It was about a 1.5 hr drive
northwest of La Paz to get to the ruins. It was very interesting to see some of
the very rural and very poor villages that dotted the top of the very high
altitude (more than 13,000 feet) plateau (altoplano) to the west of La Paz. It really
was a barren landscape, maybe similar to some of the barren areas of Wyoming or
Kosovo. In fact, a lot of La Paz reminds me a lot of Prishtina and the surrounding
areas. There are a lot of concrete buildings that are only partially finished,
or the 2nd or 3rd floors might be completely unfinished so
they just look like ghost structures, just like it was in Kosovo.
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| Many ruins are in poor condition due to looting and amateur archaeology. |
We arrived at the ruins and started with a poorly organized museum tour to see some of the pottery pieces that have been unearthed from the
civilization. Basically, the Tiahuanacan people were around from ~1500 B.C. to
1500 A.D. This site, which is very close to Lake Titicaca (relatively) was
thought to be the center of the civilization. So far, they don’t know that much
about the civilization or why it suddenly declined. Some people believe that
they were conquered by the Incas.
The highlights of the ruins for me were the
sun “doorways” which served as season telling calendars. They were designed so
that the sun pathway came through at 45º or 90º depending on whether it was the
summer/winter solstice or the spring/autumn equinox. There were also some cool
idolic statues that have been discovered, but some of the remaining ruins were
slightly disappointing because some Bolivian archeologists in the 1950s
“recreated” the site with cement mortar, not at all representative of how the
amazing structures were actually built. We had an interesting lunch of rice,
french fries, cucumbers, carrots, and llama steaks.
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| Sun gate |
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| An underground facility, presumably for burying the dead |
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| There is still a lot of work to be done at this site, not much is actually known about these people. |
I ended up chatting at great length with Darren, the office manager at Gravity Bolivia about wanting to start a guiding company and he told me that as luck would have
it, the owner of the company, Alistair, would be staying at La Senda Verde (the
animal sanctuary) on Saturday night as well and he'd set up a meeting for us to talk...somehow this seemed like the
Universe opening a door for me!
Saturday May 11,
2013: La Paz/Death Road/La Senda Verde (Gravity Bolivia, MTBs)
Another early start as it was a 1.5 mile walk to the World’s
Most Deadly Road (WMDR) ride pickup spot, which also has
breakfast...thankfully! We met up with our guide, Rylan from Nelson, B.C. and
loaded up the bus to head up to La Cumbre (4670 meters high) and the start of
our bike trip.
After the guides got us all sorted with our kit and bikes, we had
a little “how to ride bikes” chat and then blessed our ride by giving thanks to Pacha Mama
(Mother Earth) with a little corn alcohol ceremony. We poured a little bit of
the alcohol on our front tyre, a little on the ground and then a little in our
mouth! Then we were off for the 1st 30 km down the pavement, which
was just the warm up for the Death Road! (The road was constructed over about a
20 year period beginning in the 1930s and was constructed by Paraguayan
prisoners from the Chaco War.) It was pretty obvious from the very beginning
that our group was going to be really spread out!! James from the Midlands and
I were quite keen to hold our guides wheel and then a bunch in the middle with
3 girls slower than Christmas off the back!
We stopped many times to regroup,
go through drug check points and give updates about the next sections of the
road. For the most part, the ride was not difficult at all! The hardest part
about it was the nervous novice idiots from all of the other riding companies
that you had to weave your way around with a 100-200 meter drop off cliff on
the left the whole way! Being able to stick right on Rylan’s wheel most of the
time actually made the ride entertaining and FAST, so it wasn’t boring and the views
were spectacular! There was 1 corner where apparently in the 1940’s, there were
5 different leaders of 5 different political parties vying for power and the
leader of 1 of the groups had all of the other leaders kidnapped. They were
then taken up the road and at one of the corners with an exceptionally large
and sheer drop, they were all tossed over the edge! That’s 1 way to guarantee
that you’ll be in charge!!
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| Tribute to Pacha Mama before heading down the World's Most Dangerous Road |
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| Looking across to the Death Road |
Throughout the trip there were these horribly annoying
Israeli guys who wouldn’t listen to anything Rylan was saying. They were making
a documentary of their year of travels, so they were always talking on the camera and generally being rude, but then when it came time to start riding,
they were both riding with their headphones in the whole time so they couldn’t
hear other people or cars trying to pass! They started to piss me off about 5
seconds into the ride, and once we hit the actual dirt on the Death Road, they
always insisted on trying to get out and start in front of me, only to be pains
in the ass when I would inevitably need to pass them shortly after setting off!
They had such holier than though attitudes all day, it was really irritating.
When we finally got to our final stopping point, Rylan clearly pointed out that
there was a truck coming up the road, so to make sure to stay to the left!! Well,
just like he had been doing all day, one of the Israeli guys was doing exactly
opposite of what Rylan said and was riding really far on the right side and ran
straight into the truck! Luckily for all of the people in the truck and
unfortunately for the asshole on the bike, nobody was hurt, but the bike was totally
destroyed!! Those guys were such idiots!!
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| Living on the edge, haha |
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| Coca-Cola, all the world over |
Later that evening, I met up with Alistair (El Jefe), the
owner of Gravity Boliva, and we had a really great chat about a lot of things
having to do with starting up a MTB guiding company, branding, marketing,
etc...It really was fortuitous that I decided to do the ride and to delay my
arrival at La Senda Verde by 2 days! Many thanks Universe for opening doors for
me!
Sunday May 12,
2013: La Senda Verde
I got up in the morning and joined Alistair and Karen (his
wife) and the U.S. Embassy crew for breakfast. After that, Lauren, one of the long-term
volunteers who had been primarily working as a monkey “mom” gave me a tour of
the preserve and told me a lot about the really sad trafficking stories about
the animals at the sanctuary. The primary animals are at the sanctuary are
monkeys and macaws with several parrots, parakeets, and 1 toucan. There are
also a lot of turtles and tortoises, 1 caiman, and 2 endangered Andean
Spectacled Bears.
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| Nina, coyly posing for the camera |
I think that there are 7 different species of monkeys,
spider monkeys, red and yellow howler monkeys, capuchins, squirrel monkeys, and
maybe 2 others. There are 11 spider monkeys and 7 howler monkeys, and they all
definitely have names. Unfortunately right now, the Alpha male Spider monkey
had been the dominant leader of the troupe, but since spider monkeys and howler monkeys often interact and travel
together, when an alpha male Howler arrived, they started fighting, and now the
alpha spider monkey as to be caged so that they alpha howler won’t kill it,
even though it spends its entire day stalking the cage!
Anyway, it was pretty cool, when I was getting the monkey
portion of the tour, it became really clear how smart the monkeys are and how
much they recognize people, as they came running up to Lauren when we arrived! 1 spider monkey
decided to let me hold it for just a little bit. Their hands, feet, and tails
are so strong! It’s really cool, the end of their tails has skin just like a
finger, so it actually has a unique “tail print” just like a fingerprint would!
It was really nice to chat with Marcelo (Monkey Man, owner and founder of La
Senda Verde) for a little bit about the different monkeys, their behaviours and
habits, etc... It was amazing to watch him interact with the monkeys! At one
point there were at least 3 spider monkeys clinging to and hanging on him!
There is a very elaborate system of volunteers at the
sanctuary. The minimum stay is 2 weeks, and you still have to pay to be there,
although less than it costs someone like me just to stay, but some people stay
for much longer! When an animal is brought to the sanctuary, they first have to
go through a quarantine process to make sure they are not sick and then to make
sure that they can “play well” with others. These are the animals that the
“guests” never see or interact with. It does require a small army of people to feed
and clean up after all of these animals (about 350) on a daily basis! One of
the very cool volunteer tasks for a “lucky” long term volunteer is getting to
be a monkey mom. Basically, sometimes baby monkeys arrive that are too little
to just join with the others, and if it is a species that doesn’t have old
enough females at the sanctuary to act as a monkey mom, a person has to be the
surrogate. It’s pretty much a full time job, you even sleep cuddled up with the
monkey to keep them warm. Once the monkey is big enough, they are introduced
into the troupe and they start interacting with the others...although sometimes
the wrong species! The most recently weaned howler thinks she is a spider
monkey!
Later in the day, I was again chatting with Marcelo out near
the tortoises about how smart they are, and I was treated to a cuddle from a
spider monkey and the new baby howler monkey at the same time...one hugging me
like a baby and one sitting on my head! How very, very cool! I had never realized just how amazing these little
creatures are!!
Monday May 13,
2013: La Senda Verde
It’s really nice to just wake up because the sounds of the
cloud forest are becoming active and are beginning to wake you up! Yesterday I
moved into the tree house...pretty much half of the reason for me wanting to
come here! It’s very basic with two mattresses on the floor and a loft with two
more, but it is so very cool! It’s like being a little kid again!! You have to walk
across a suspension bridge to get to it and then you’re high above almost
everything at the sanctuary. I slept really well and am not looking forward to
heading back to La Paz tomorrow!
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| The treehouse...getting to feel like a little kid again for a few days. :) |
I tried to go see one of the bears during the bear feeding this
morning but he never showed up. L
Maybe tomorrow. It’s been really nice to
be here without any objective and without having to travel imminently! I sat on
the tree house balcony watching the monkeys swing around in the trees at the
same height, pretty cool. I had 1 little visitor who decided to nap on the
suspension bridge for about 45 minutes. I sat with her for about 10 minutes,
but she never wanted to come over for a cuddle.
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| A napping visitor on the wobbly suspension bridge leading to the treehouse |
I joined Lauren, who was leaving today and was very sad to
be saying goodbye to her “baby” howler monkey and watched the spider monkeys
and howlers be so playful and mischievous for about an hour. They are so damn
cute, I could watch them all day long!
After that, I decided to walk into Yolosa (the nearest
village) and go do the zipline: 1.7 km spread out over 3 sections with a max
speed of 85 km/hr (53 mph)! It was pretty expensive (220Bs/$30), but it was a
pretty awesome experience. I decided to go Superman style, which is basically
like flying over the jungle like a bird, well worth £20! On my way to and from
Yolosa, I was enamoured with the # of mariposas (butterflies) that there were!!
Butterflies were 1 of the things that I was most excited about seeing when I
got here, and I have been treated to some absolutely stunning varieties!
Unfortunately, they are damn hard to take pictures of!!
I headed back to the sanctuary to cool off and go for a swim
in the river. Before I headed down to the river, I decided to read a little on
my balcony and was treated to an unexpected visit from one of the spider
monkeys. It was really funny because she came over to me, and I thought she
might crawl up for a cuddle, but instead, she wrapped herself completely,
almost painfully around my leg and foot. I kept trying to get her to sit in my
lap, but she just wanted to hug my leg! Every time someone would walk by below,
she would run off and then come back and begin to clutch my leg again. It was
really bizarre, she was holding onto my leg so tightly, almost as if she was
scared. After awhile, she left, and I decided to go for a very refreshing swim
in the river. On my way down, I got another cuddle from one of the spider
monkeys who had been the object of some of the WMDR riders attention. Spider monkeys are
unique, as they only have 4 fingers and no opposable thumbs on their hands.
It’s amazing how dexterous they are even without the thumb!
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| No thumbs for the spider monkeys... allows for more agile tree swinging. |
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| Such delicate, lovely hands and feet |
Man, did the swim in the river ever feel good. It was a bit
chilly but much invited with the jungle heat and humidity! There is gold in the
river that we swim in, so I definitely did a little “hand panning” with
handfuls of pebbles as I swam...no luck, though!
In my opinion, the worst time of day here is the last hour
before dark, as the birds go absolutely mental, and they are so loud and
obnoxious. Like I said before, I’m very over the
macaws! Haha They rival the horn honking in the city for annoying level! At
least they shut up when it gets dark, I suppose.
Tuesday May 14,
2013: La Senda Verde/Death Road/ La Paz (Gravity Bolivia ride)
Today is my last day at La Senda Verde, so I’m hoping to
make the most of it before hitching a ride back to La Paz with Gravity when
they get here. I was up and at it and at breakfast for 8:30, as I was asked to
be by Gavin, the head cook, so I could let the volunteers know that I wanted to
go on the bear tour. As soon as I walk in the door he says, “You’ll have to
wait for your breakfast!” If this place wants to actually make money off of
people staying here, Gavin, specifically, needs to work on his customer
service. Also, he’s from South Africa and super racist, which I don’t ever
appreciate! Anyway...I finished up with breakfast and was excited to go see
Aruma, the male Andean Spectecaled Bear, but...once again, I was thwarted. Oh
well, it’s not a zoo, so I don’t mind, too much!
I went back and was sitting outside of the dining area when
several monkeys came to sit in my lap, including Canola, the newly weaned
howler who they are trying to convince that she is a monkey and not a human.
Anyway, 1 of the volunteers came running out, freaking out that she was in my
lap and took her back to the monkey area near Marcelo’s house. Meanwhile, I
decided to go organize my stuff a bit and to read my book on the balcony of the
tree house. Since the tree house is connected to the walking path via the
suspension bridge, you know when anyone, or anything is crossing the bridge. I was sat reading my book when the whole tree house started shaking, so I thought someone was coming to tell
me I needed to get my stuff checked out, but the next thing that I knew, a
bunch of monkeys were coming round the corner to come hang out on the balcony!
There were 4 spider monkeys and 4 howler monkeys. I had interacted with the
spider monkeys quite a bit, but I was a little bit nervous about the howlers as
I hadn’t interacted with them at all, really. I decided just to sit still and
see what they were all about. They seem to enjoy crawling all over you,
grabbing your hands and fingers, preening your hang nails for you and nibbling
on things here and there and generally just molesting you a bit, haha! At one
point, 2 of the larger howlers (very large cat sized) both decided that they
wanted to nap in my lap, so I thought, why not?!?
Unfortunately my bum was
falling asleep nearly from the get go, as the balcony bench was less than
comfortable! As the monkeys “settled in” for their morning nap, there ended up
being a pile of 3 howlers (1 baby) and 3 spiders in the far corner of the deck
(~5ftx3ft) and 1 beautiful howler sleeping on my lap like a cuddly kitty! The
howlers fur is actually pretty soft and it was nice to just sit there and pet
it whilst it took a nap. After awhile, my favourite and a very cheeky and often
naughty spider monkey decided that she wanted in on a little bit of the
cuddling action! She was so cute, she found some room on my lap next to the
howler and then faced her tummy outwards and reached her arms up and around my
neck to give me a backwards hug!
Although I was meant to “move out” of the tree house by noon, I couldn’t
possibly leave this little bit of paradise cuddling with the monkeys, so I ended
up sitting and enjoying the moment, albeit with a completely numb ass, for 2.5
hours! At one point even 1 of the ADHD beautiful little squirrel monkeys decided to
come check out the party, and at one point it ran across my shoulder and lap,
but it didn’t stick around long enough for a cuddle, just long enough for a
couple of photos. After awhile, I needed to pack up and their 2.5 hr nap was
coming to an end, they woke up, started grooming each other and eventually
jumped off into the trees to go frollick and be mischievous little monkeys!
Honestly, those 2.5 hours were 1 of the coolest experiences I’ve had in my
whole life! J
After that, I moved out of the tree house and sat and watched the monkeys
playing in the trees whilst I waited for Gravity to arrive for my unfortunate
departure back to La Paz. I did get a few more cuddles since the monkeys often
hang around the dining building during lunchtime. In fact, 1 of the baby
howler’s was being cheeky and playful and ultimately bit me (playfully) on my
forearm, but it still hurt like hell and left a bruise for several days!
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| So much fun to cuddle with this one for a couple of hours. |
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| Such cuties...one of the highlights of my trip! |
Gravity Boliva finally arrived, and I stuffed as much food from the buffet
in my face as I could, as I wasn’t planning to eat dinner in La Paz when we got
back. ~3:00 we headed off for the 3.4-4 hr bus ride back up the Death Road.
Apparently driving up the road is the safer travel option, as the traffic
drives “UK style” on the road so that the downhill driver can see just how many
inches they are away from the plummeting cliff on their left! We stopped a
couple of times to take some photos and Steve (dread locked Gravity guide) told
us that the road was built in 1908 (actually 1930s) by the Paraguayan
prisoner’s of war. In the 20 years it took them to build the road, I would
imagine that the death toll was pretty high! When we got back, I literally ran
up the hill to see if Malena, my favourite tour/transportation coordinator was
still there to book me onto the tourist bus to Copocabana for the next
morning...she was! Yea!! Only 1 more night feeling like I was in “city prison”
in La Paz. It was time to start making my way to Peru.
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