Queen of the road!
Sunday, February 12th, 2006Sunday 12th – Sucre
well lots to tell! I got to Vallegrande to find it rainyand muddy and very out of the way. no-one at all spoke English so I felt a complete plonker with my very poor spanish asking how to get to La Higuera ( where Che was shot) and how to get to Sucre on the bus. I got a taxi to take me to La Higuera – 3 hours there and 3 hours back in pouring rain on very dodgey road with rock falls and mud. I had to drive at one time whilst Ramiro my driver first pushed and then pulled with rope to get out of the mud! so many things I would like to ask Che. Why up there in the middle of nowhere? Some Argentine young men who spoke immaculate English said they thought he thought differently to us europeans – start small he thought and work up. I was very pleased I´d been. On the way back we had a quick look at the airfield – now deserted – where he was buried until 1997. great I was feliz! Wet but feliz! I had a drink with a couple of locals and my driver and drove back.
Now the long tale begins! I´ll cut it short – no bus on saturday because full so i thought the young man at the cultural information centre said there would be a bus from nearby Mataral at 8am. One hour by taxi. I got up at 5.30 for taxi at 6.30. At Mataral for 7.35. Now this is where the problem begins! Mataral, a none horse town where all I saw was a sheep following a man on a bicycle, saw apiece of traffic on average once every half hour. At 8.30 I asked a young woman when the bus was due – a man mending shoes told us it was 9pm !!! I realised I was stuck. Do i go back or try to get a lift? Well the adventurer in me said geta lift. A lovely man stopped in his jeep and said he could get me to next town where maybe another ´flota´(bus) would go through. Great I thought. so off we set. It was hot and getting hotter as I took my place on a step under a colonade. Some concerned locals told me the bus was at 11pm which meant it was the same bus just a bit further on the road! I sat there for 6 hours by which time I looked like aunt Sally from worzel Gummidge – red cheeks and nose! My knight on a shining ruddy great Volvo truck came along at 5.45. He was called Sallo and we were to spend the next 15 hours on the road in his truck – even sleeping together (him on his bed in back of cab and me on recliner!). At midnight at the oasis when the truck had a blown tyre, I managed to get my first cup of tea for the day! Exhausted there is no way to describe my utter hopelessness. But, we made it through some amazing scenery that if I ever crack this uploading after changes to the site you will see. Cooler here in Sucre thank goodness – dont look quite as much like aunt Sally today! Having real problems with photos. will try to get info from Bootsnall. Bye for now xx
Freejan