Thursday, November 19, 2009

the earth gets naked - part one

Good place for a nap - Tupiza, Boliva.


I couldn't leave Bolivia and return to my New Mexico desert without a visit to the high, dry south of this country. I went for it's geothermal action, big salty flats, volcanoes, flamingos, and fanciful animals like spindle-legged vicuna and curly tailed rabbits. I'd only read about this desert realm. Could those fables have truth to them? To find out I joined my friends, Audrey and Dan of uncorneredmarket in Oruro, west of Cochabamba where we'd pick up a train south to Tupiza - but not before having juice. Fresh juice is a meal - and I try to have it several times a day, like other meals.

Oruro to Tupiza is 12 hours by train and out my window the view looked like a western. We were traveling into Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid territory. The stories you read say they met an untimly end near the town of Tupiza. It was odd to think of them in Bolivia until I arrived in its desert south. They may have felt as at home as I did in the dry, red rock country. Tupiza was sleepy and laid back - like its street dogs.

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