Cochabamba Hotels
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Walking in canyons with dinosaurs in Toro Toro
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I went to Cochabamba, mainly as a starting point for a visit to Toro Toro. I spent a day in Cochabamba first though, to find out about tours, transport, etc. No tours clearly, also not that much transport either, actualy just not much information about it at all. But I was lucky to run into a French couple in my hostal and they provided me with all the info I needed. The rest of the day I spent with some ausies (they are just everywhere over here!), exploring the city, taking the teleferico up to a hill where the biggest Jezus statue in the world wactches over the city, eating in the central market, ... (and oh, before I forget, eating a delicious pizza at night).
I left for Toro Toro the next morning at 6 o´clock, no choice, it was the only bus. The distance to Toro Toro isn´t that far, some 130 km, but it took us 6 hours anyway which is the normal time to pass the realy bumpy road. It´s not that bad though, as I learned later, the trip is a lot easier now than some years ago when it took more than 10 hours and after a rainy day even more than a day. Arrived in Toro Toro it became soon clear that it is realy off the beaten track as I was the only tourist in town. I stayed in the place the French couple adviced me and they were so right in describing it as a realy great place to stay. "Las hermanas" is run by a woman named Lily, doughter of the owners, who also live there. Staying there is more like staying in a host family, as I ate together with them in their living room, watched TV together with them and most of all Lily just does everything to make you enjoy your stay as interesting and enjoyable a possible.
The rest of the day I didn´t do much more than booking a guide for the next day in the "tourism office", wandering aroudn town and reading. During that latter activity, which I did on the "central square", I had a, in the beginning, rather funny conversation with some local school kids and I helped one with his English homework (I actualy just made it). After a while I started to become surrounded by those little things, and when they discovered how funny my hand palms where (I don´t know why, but they were just crazy about them) and all started to touch them, fun was over and I politely told them I urgently had to go back to my hostal. In the hostal, I had a great meal and watched the news about the troubles in Huanuni where different miner groups were killing each other in a dispute over selling the mine to the state or not. If they sell the mine, they get a fixed wage and social advantages, if they don´t they remain free and just own what they find in the mine. Well, they clearly disagree enough over this issue to throw dynamite to each other.
Next day I went to the cave Umajalanta with my personal guide Felix. A young guy, 20 years old, and a whole relief after the mostly bad guides, who just do it because they now tourist have money, frequently don´t know anything more about the place than the thing that also are in my guide book and are often just repeating there fixed story without realy listing to your questions and therefore answering them by repeating a part of there earlier story (might also be because they just don´t know the answer of course(I have to mention that my guides on Huayna Potosi and in the pampa´s don´t fit in this discription either). Felix was clearly fascinated by the surroundings, the dino tracks,
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