After a (relatively) quick trip to Lake Titicaca, Jenn reflects on her time in Bolivia: it doesn’t make sense, it takes longer than it needs to, but everyone is friendly and it all turns out okay.
Tortuga Travels: Week Seven: La Fin, Bolivia
Bolivia
It’s the last day of November and I’m packing my bikini. With a week to go before my TACA ticket whisks me away, Carrie and I are taking advantage of a brief and unlikely roadblock window for a quick adventure to that highlight of traveler checklists, Lake Titicaca.
“You know what they say,” laughs Jacqueline’s drunk companion, “The titi is for Bolivia and the caca is for Peru!” And of course we do know, because every single “They” we’ve talked to has said just that. It’s a small country, Bolivia, and they milk what they’ve got.
La Paz’s bus station – an auditorium of mayhem we have had the pleasure of passing though before – is inconveniently located up a particularly long and steep hill, so we have bought bus tickets in advance at a downtown travel agency. Bright and early we take a taxi to the station and begin a futile search for the bus company’s booth. We are directed to the front and then to the rear of the building by random clerks, and then across the street by the (lack of) information office attendant.
Eventually a friendly saleswoman, noticing us walking by her for the third time, examines our tickets and frowns grimly. She telephones the agency and then procedes to escort us to the curb out back of the depot to wait by the highway for the passing bus. (Just before boarding we are accosted by yet another uniformed agent who insists that we pay the Terminal Exit Tax, apparently unconcerned that, unlike other passengers, we don’t seem to be actually using the terminal at all.)
Compared to the boarding, the bus trip itself is fairly uneventful – with the exception of a channel crossing for which passengers have to disembark and hop into small motor boats while the bus crosses on a bus-sized barge being constantly bailed out by a man with a bucket. At last the reloaded bus clears the hill looking down on Copacabana, a small town perched on the lake’s shore.
Now, when you read the word “lake,” you are picturing, perhaps, a canoe-friendly pond, or the place you used to go fishing, or maybe even a Great Lake like Erie or Ontario. However, the volume of Lake Ontario probably evaporates off of Titicaca every hour. Titicaca calls into question your whole understanding of the term “lake.” It is more of a saltless sea, stretching horizon to horizon, blue green and rocking and laughing at your sense of scale.
Copacabana, like any seaside tourist town, has erratic shop-lined streets leading to a messy little beach, patrolled by passers-through stopping for an ice cream, a new sarong and a look at the dreadlocked sidewalk jewelry vendors before moving on. Carrie and I play our part, quickly hopping a boat for the blustery hour-long trip to Isla del Sol.
Bolivia’s famous Isla is a rocky green outcropping jutting abruptly up from the water, a roadless oasis half terraced into fields and pastures and half left as scraggly scrub and cliff. Its dramatic edges provide only a handful of beaches, one of which we dock at. Up an impressive stone staircase that welcomes us we scale the side of the island to reach the tiny village of Yumani, where the children greet us with outstretched hands and cries of “Regalame!” and “Chocolate!” – having met too many tourists blowing through for an hour handing out candies. Here we find a dinner of the Lake’s famous trucha (trout) that my veggie stomach reluctantly enjoys.
In the morning we set out hiking to Cha’lla, a reportedly beautiful beach and a good midway point on the route to the northern dock at Cha’llapampa. Though we can see most of the island from our starting point on its ridge, we have no map and the trails are at best informal, used only by local farmers and shepherds who know the land well. We quickly find ourselves weaving between irregular fields and tossing our packs over rock outcroppings, clamoring down in the general direction of the beach. By midafternoon we are winding our way through the narrow dirt roads of Cha’lla amid the sounds of pigs, cows and chickens abundant in dusty pens abutting the small houses. At the base of the village there is a single pension on the bright stretch of beach. Two small girls lead us up a freestanding concrete staircase to a room that is one quarter window, filled by Titicaca.
Famished from our hike we eagerly ask the pension se�ora if she can prepare lunch, almuerzo. With an apologetic shake of the head she informs us that the nearest place to fill this request is Cha’llapampa, several rocky hours away. We ask if there is a tienda here, maybe just someone selling bread or soda from her home. Frowning again the se�ora offers timidly to make us something, and we happily accept. Fifteen minutes later she brings us plates piled high with fresh trout, mixed vegetables, rice and fried potatoes. Her Bolivian hospitality would not allow her to call this “almuerzo”: there was no soup.
In the late afternoon we lie out on the beach. We are its only occupants except for the occasional shepherd leading a flock of sheep over the sand. Although the sun is strong the local dress is universally modest, and I muster the courage (or distaste, depending on your point of view) for only one quick run into the water before racing back to the cover of my t-shirt.
The se�ora prepares an evening feast for the six travellers in Cha’lla: quinoa soup, vegetables, bread, eggs, trout, potatoes and tea. Quinoa is a tasty and highly nutritious grain that grows well in Bolivia, but it was outlawed by the Spanish in favor of less nutritious, poorer growing crops that were more “European.” This story has come to illustrate all of my newfound thoughts on the machine of colonialism: the need to outlaw a grain.
In the morning we finish the trip to Cha’llapampa and spend the day drawing; we have heard a boat will be coming through the next day. After an early night – as they tend to be when there is no electricity – we wake anxious to get back to La Paz. In theory this should take five hours: 1.5 on a boat and 3 on the bus. But we know all too well the dangers of estimating travel time here, and we are not disappointed in this final journey.
A boat of tourists pulls in at 1pm and we ask the captain if he is going to Copacabana. Yes, he says without hesitation, he will leave in an hour after everyone has taken a look around. When the boat sets out, however, it immediately seems we are going the wrong way; our suspicions are confirmed when we dock at the tiny Isla de la Lune. We learn, over the next five hours, that we have boarded a day tour boat – the sort that makes numerous 45 minute stops for those that want to “do Titicaca” in a single day. The captain declined to mention this as we might have waited for a direct boat. We arrive in La Paz at 11.
My last few days in Bolivia are going in a flash: holiday postcards to send out, last minute souvenirs to buy. Clearing up the problem of my mysteriously cancelled airline ticket – in person at the TACA office, the only even numbered building on the odd side of the street – seems an appropriate end to my time in Bolivia: it doesn’t make sense, it takes longer than it needs to, but everyone is friendly and it all turns out okay.
Finally, sleepy 4 a.m. goodbyes to Carrie and Jacqueline, and one last look as my taxi crests the border of La Paz, its crater filling with morning light.