The horse that wouldn't go in Tupiza

My one and only interest in going to Tupiza was to ride through the countryside. I'd heard that it was spectacular. But true to form, whenever, and whereever I go riding I get the dud horse. The horse that likes to stop and eat the bushes. The horse that won't go faster no matter how hard you kick it. In New Zealand, I got the horse with the crap canter (Tor got the x-trotter, so she probably lost out more....hahaha) In Tupiza, it was the horse that wouldn't go.

After recovering from our bus polava, Claire and I booked in for an early morning ride through the breathtaking red rocky valleys of Tupiza. It was a definite change from the landscape we'd been used to out the bus window - very American frontier, wild wild west - cowboys or cowgirls in our case, complete with chaps and sombreros.

I kicked and squeezed the crap out of my horse. Perhaps it was the fact that I was wearing Vans, so maybe my energetic kicks weren't as hard as I thought they were.... but still no good. He would continue to meander along like an old man. Claire's horse meanwhile would break into a trot for no apparent reason. There were beautiful valleys to canter through as well :(

Oh well, I suppose that considering the only thing that would have been between the ground and my head had I come off was a sombrero, it was probably a good thing. Bolivian safety standards also ensured I got chaps... cause I was really concerned about my jeans at this point (?!?!?!).

I did get to swap with the guide after a while - after he told me in his broken English that his horse was 'crazy.' Hmmmmm. I thought twice about swapping with him after he told me that, but he was a beautiful (but angry) horse and I couldn't resist - and what do you know, he actually went when you kicked him (so it wasn't the Vans....).

'Who eats wins' also went big in Tupiza. Claire and I hit the local street food markets for food - sampling some tasty (yet unknown) variety of meat with a side of black potatoes. We must have picked the good stuff, because the guy opposite us, after consuming his own meal, proceeded to order exactly what we were having. Black potatoes are not the tastiest thing in the world, but whatever the meat was it was delicious!

We also sampled a traditional Bolivian drink that we'd been eyeing since spotting it on stalls in La Paz. We'd guessed at what we thought it was - my guess was some kind of cured meat like prosciutto, floating in a light orangy coloured water. From far away it looked like a tiny animal foetus because it was all squidgy and fleshy looking. Turns out however that it is dehydrated peach, or 'Mocochinchi', and it actually wasn't that bad. Wouldn't be the first thing that I reached for, but still quite thirst quenching.

Bogged in Bolivia

It was bound to happen. The roads aren't paved; the buses aren't 4WDs; and it had been raining.

When we got back from Uyuni and jumped straight on a bus for Tupiza - the 'wild west' of Bolivia. Woo hoo - reasonably short bus ride I thought. What a jinx. The 6 hour bus ride quickly turned into a 14 hour expedition when our driver, who apparently likes to drive cross country, decided it would be better to go off road (why I don't know when the road is already made of dirt...), and straight into a massive mud puddle. Yes, the journey was smoother, for the good minute before we hit the mud patch, but it meant that we spent the next 3 and 1/2 hours with everyone off the bus tyring to dig it out and jack it up, covering the mud with salt bush in the freezing cold night. At about 2:30am, everyone gave up, went back inside and fell asleep. At 6:30am our tow arrived.

 

 
(No Tor Tor, there were no donkey's to tow us out. And in Boliva, there are no trees to wrench ourselves out with either)