La Ciudad Blanca
My attempts to catch up on sleep in Potosi were again thwarted by the fact that pretty much every traveller there seems to be headed out on the tours to the mines, which inevitably means there's lots of people bumping around about 7:30 in the morning. Still, in this case being awoken for this wasn't such a bad thing, as it meant I had a chance to say goodbye properly to Julien and Stine. After that, I spent much of the morning reading. A little too much, in fact, as when I went to get a cab over to the bus station, I found that the centre of town had totally snarled up, so I ended up walking there. Luckily this was pretty much all downhill, but I was stressed and somewhat warmed up by the time I arrived at the bus station, with only 5 minutes before my bus was due to go. The bus itself was again not great, but at least was better than the one from Uyuni had been, although as I was squeezed in by the window I unfortunately didn't have the option this time of putting my legs into the aisle to stretch out. There was some more amazing mountain scenery as the road, luckily paved this time, switchbacked its way over to La Ciudad Blanca, the "White City" as Sucre is known.
Sucre also has the distinction of being Bolivia's capital. Or one of them, depending on your interpretation of events. You see, the city is technically the judicial capital, being host to the Supreme Court, and is also the birthplace of Bolivian independence. However, the government and legislature are both based up in La Paz, which is also the main centre for businesses and the international travel gateway. This is slightly similar to South Africa, where the parliament sits in Cape Town, the legislative capital, the civil service of the government is based in Pretoria, the executive capital, and the Supreme Court is based in Bloemfontein, the judicial capital. In practice, pretty much everything of importance politically in Bolivia happens in La Paz, but sniffy residents of Sucre still refer to their city as the capital, dismissing La Paz as "the seat of government". Ok, Civics lesson for the day over.
My mild disgruntlement at the bus company increased somewhat when I discovered that the bus had reached its final destination, and it wasn't the bus terminal! Annoyingly, somewhat like what happens in Chile, the bus had finished its journey at the offices of the company instead. This was particularly annoying as one of my reasons for picking my hostel in Sucre, the HI, was that it was only a few minutes' walk from said station. Nothing to be done about it, though, except to get a cab across town, in the company of a Canadian who was aiming to get a connecting bus out of town that night. Arrival at the hostel also soothed my slightly irate mood, as the guy on the front desk was very polite and helpful (albeit once again all in Spanish, a situation to which I am now getting used and beginning to appreciate, as my language skills are improving slightly) and it turned out I had room 24 (a 4-bed dorm) all to myself, and it opened out directly onto the balcony at the rear of the house, overlooking the garden. Nice.
Next task was to head back to the bus station, running the usual gauntlet of exhuast fumes, honking taxis and rumbling micro-buses when crossing the main road, and sort out my bus ticket out of town for Thursday. I was determined to do this in plenty of time so as to make sure (a) I got a cama (sleeper) service and (b) I got one of the seats on their own that I liked. In the latter case, I was to fare even better than hoped, as I managed to get the seat right at the front, so nobody would be lowering their seat-back into my personal space. Mission accomplished. This done, I got myself cleaned up back at the hostel, and then headed into town in search of some dinner. I was slightly delayed once again by traffic, in this case a near-solid file of micros grinding their way down the hill into the centre of town, but made it to within a couple of blocks of the central plaza by around 7:30, and started having a look at some of the restaurants Stine had helpfuly recommended.
At this point, I got the first of what have been many frequent recent demonstrations of how the Gringo Trail keeps bringing you back into contact with the same people over and over, when I walked past the window of a pizzeria and did a double-take as I saw Mark and Katie, from the salt flats trip, sitting there. I popped in and had a chat with them, during which it turned out that Jun, Miriam and Robin from the trip were also in town. I then headed on to have my dinner at a nice little bar/restaurant called Florin, one of a bafflingly large number of such in town under Dutch ownership. One pleasant chicken shoarma later (I was in the mood for something other than typical Bolivian food at this point), I ambled out and nearly bumped straight into Jun, and ended up staying and having a couple of Happy Hour drinks with him, Robin and Miriam. Once they headed for bed, I popped into the Joy Ride, reportedly the busiest hotbed of Gringo nightlife in town, for a swift beer, but tiredness and the fact that, for the first time in the city, I didn't see anyone I knew meant I headed back to the hostel by midnight, where I then embarrassed myself by standing outside the wrong door to the hostel, getting upset that nobody had answered the bell, when the one I actually needed to use was a couple of metres away and unlocked. Oops.
Sucre also has the distinction of being Bolivia's capital. Or one of them, depending on your interpretation of events. You see, the city is technically the judicial capital, being host to the Supreme Court, and is also the birthplace of Bolivian independence. However, the government and legislature are both based up in La Paz, which is also the main centre for businesses and the international travel gateway. This is slightly similar to South Africa, where the parliament sits in Cape Town, the legislative capital, the civil service of the government is based in Pretoria, the executive capital, and the Supreme Court is based in Bloemfontein, the judicial capital. In practice, pretty much everything of importance politically in Bolivia happens in La Paz, but sniffy residents of Sucre still refer to their city as the capital, dismissing La Paz as "the seat of government". Ok, Civics lesson for the day over.
My mild disgruntlement at the bus company increased somewhat when I discovered that the bus had reached its final destination, and it wasn't the bus terminal! Annoyingly, somewhat like what happens in Chile, the bus had finished its journey at the offices of the company instead. This was particularly annoying as one of my reasons for picking my hostel in Sucre, the HI, was that it was only a few minutes' walk from said station. Nothing to be done about it, though, except to get a cab across town, in the company of a Canadian who was aiming to get a connecting bus out of town that night. Arrival at the hostel also soothed my slightly irate mood, as the guy on the front desk was very polite and helpful (albeit once again all in Spanish, a situation to which I am now getting used and beginning to appreciate, as my language skills are improving slightly) and it turned out I had room 24 (a 4-bed dorm) all to myself, and it opened out directly onto the balcony at the rear of the house, overlooking the garden. Nice.
Next task was to head back to the bus station, running the usual gauntlet of exhuast fumes, honking taxis and rumbling micro-buses when crossing the main road, and sort out my bus ticket out of town for Thursday. I was determined to do this in plenty of time so as to make sure (a) I got a cama (sleeper) service and (b) I got one of the seats on their own that I liked. In the latter case, I was to fare even better than hoped, as I managed to get the seat right at the front, so nobody would be lowering their seat-back into my personal space. Mission accomplished. This done, I got myself cleaned up back at the hostel, and then headed into town in search of some dinner. I was slightly delayed once again by traffic, in this case a near-solid file of micros grinding their way down the hill into the centre of town, but made it to within a couple of blocks of the central plaza by around 7:30, and started having a look at some of the restaurants Stine had helpfuly recommended.
At this point, I got the first of what have been many frequent recent demonstrations of how the Gringo Trail keeps bringing you back into contact with the same people over and over, when I walked past the window of a pizzeria and did a double-take as I saw Mark and Katie, from the salt flats trip, sitting there. I popped in and had a chat with them, during which it turned out that Jun, Miriam and Robin from the trip were also in town. I then headed on to have my dinner at a nice little bar/restaurant called Florin, one of a bafflingly large number of such in town under Dutch ownership. One pleasant chicken shoarma later (I was in the mood for something other than typical Bolivian food at this point), I ambled out and nearly bumped straight into Jun, and ended up staying and having a couple of Happy Hour drinks with him, Robin and Miriam. Once they headed for bed, I popped into the Joy Ride, reportedly the busiest hotbed of Gringo nightlife in town, for a swift beer, but tiredness and the fact that, for the first time in the city, I didn't see anyone I knew meant I headed back to the hostel by midnight, where I then embarrassed myself by standing outside the wrong door to the hostel, getting upset that nobody had answered the bell, when the one I actually needed to use was a couple of metres away and unlocked. Oops.
posted by Pat at 12:00 pm
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