Tupiza

A foray well off the gringo trail took us to this little western styled town in the south of Bolivia. Tupiza straddles the dry riverbed of Rio Tupiza, and is flanked by red rock mountains on either side. The town has a lively market in the middle of it, but otherwise remains fairly quiet.

We arrived on a early morning night bus from Potosi. So early in fact, we almost missed our stop. Our foggy brains didn’t register that we were in Tupiza (what arrival is at 4:00am???), and the bus almost drove away with Cam on it. A frantic Graham got the attention of the bus driver, who gracefully let her off, and our arrival was made. Our hotel thankfully let us check in and gave us our room this early, so we finished our sleep there.

Our first day consisted of checking out various travel agencies. The reason’s for being in Tupiza were twofold, first, the cool looking red rocks, and second, a launching point for the Uyuni salt flats. We decided that the Uyuni tours here were too expensive for our flavours, and after three attempts, left empty handed. That’s ok, we can get other tours in Uyuni.

The town really leans into the western theme. Legend has it that two famous American western outlaws, Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, met their end in Tupiza at the hands of the Tupiza police. There’s some rumor’s that they faked their own deaths, but between that and the northern Arizona style landscape around the town, the town leans into its theme really well. We had dinner at a place called The Alamo, which played copious amounts of Alan Jackson, and had pictures of Marilyn Monroe and Dolly Parton on the walls. There were also a lot of elderly French tourists in the area, for reasons unknown to us.

The next day, and our only full day, we went for a hike to the red rocks. Every few kilometers, there are dry stream beds from flash floods. We walked to one just outside of town, taking a scenic route parallel to the cliffs. The landscape was nothing like we had seen anywhere else in Bolivia. There were a couple stray dogs on the way, but they got mad at each other instead of us. Eventually we made it to the “official,” trailhead, and turned to hike into the canyon between the rocks

We hiked up the canyon to a point where we couldn’t hike anymore. A dry waterfall blocked our path, and even after a scramble up them to scout, we decided we were not prepared to continue a scramble up the gorge. A local tour guide scolded us for going up the waterfall in the first place.

The hike was lovely, and a really nice change from the mountains that we had been through earlier. It also helps that Tupiza is at a lower elevation (2,800m), so the altitude was a non-factor for us. We spent the rest of the afternoon watching The International 12 finals, a Dota 2 e-sports tournament. Dinner was at a wonderful Giro restaurant. We had many delicious meat skewers.

We left Tupiza the next morning, as there wasn’t really anything else in the town left to do, unless we wanted to see the spot Butch Cassidy allegedly died. So off to our final Bolivian destination! We will see you there!