The Muddy-Pants Diaries

19 November 2005 (Saturday) – Torotoro to Cochabamba to Santa Cruz, Bolivia

It rained last night. There were lightning flashes and some thunder rumblings late in the night, but I think it only really started to pour at around 2am. In other places, I probably would not care less. But I was in Torotoro, where in the rainy season, it is impossible to go to (or leave) as the road (I am probably being too generous to describe it with this term) would be washed out. We were at the beginning of the rainy season and I was hoping my luck would stay with me, delaying the rain til I am gone. But, no… it came pattering down yesterday.

I had set the alarm clock at 5am. When it beeped, I ignored it. But later, I dreamt that I was hurriedly getting dressed to catch the 6am bus. And BINK! I opened my eyes suddenly and realised it was 5:37am and I hurriedly got dressed to catch the 6am bus.

Naturally, this being Bolivia, the buses never leave on time. But we were afraid of the immense crowd like we had when we came. No, according to the bus guys, it is ‘vacio’ (empty) in the morning, which, in their terms, actually mean all the seats are taken but no one is sitting or standing on the aisle.

We left after a 40-minute wait for last-minute passengers only to turn the corner and pick up more passengers and sacks of produces.

The first part of the trip already scared the wits out of me. There were rivers to cross! And I do not mean wimpy r-i-v-u-l-e-t-s! I mean GUSHING RUSHING rivers which the bus driver drove gingerly down the valley and the bus was literally swimming across!! No wonder the bus had such gigantic wheels, now I understand! We crossed 4 of these before getting onto the muddy track.

We did not drive for long before the bus was stuck in the wet mud of last night. Some macho men got off to help clear the mud with shovels and put stones on the wet puddles all around. After half an hour or so, the bus managed to pull through this area.

Then, I nodded off, all along half-murmuring a Buddhist chant for good luck. But soon, I was awakened by the commotion of people getting off the bus. Renaud asked what was happening. I guessed we were stuck again and had to get off to make the bus lighter.

But when I observed what had happened to the bus in my sleep, my blood turned cold. The front wheels were heading in one direction but at this point with the most slippery of mud, the back wheels merrily flew towards the edge without control. So, our bus was positioned in such a way that the back wheels were dangerously close to the edge of the plunge. My goodness!!! If it had gone off a little bit more, we would have been statistics in Bolivia’s number of deaths from bus accidents!

The mud here was one of those innocent-looking ones where you really do not know where to put your foot down at. You can put your foot down at one spot and walk normally, albeit a tad slippery. Or you can get your entire foot sucked in, the more you struggle, the further down you go. As the men worked on clearing the mud, and throwing drier pieces of rocks on the mud to create friction for the wheels, I was having my own personal struggle to walk along the edge of the cliff to get away from this atrocious mud and puddles of brown water.

One section of the raised edges (which was easier to walk on, if you know how to balance) actually had crumbled down totally. I wondered who was the one who fell through!!

The bus started its engine and just as it moved off, the back wheels skidded further to the edge, argh!!!!… even more dangerously off to the abyss before managing to turn inwards. I just did not breathe as I watched it.

However, not more than 30 metres, the bus skidded again, this time, the front of the bus nearly crashed with the side walls of the cliff. More macho men went to work.

We waited for quite a bit at an area that appeared drier before yeah, the bus came tumbling down our way and all of us got on. We journeyed on, but we continued to come across more narrow escapes. One of the most memorable ones was yet another river bashing. But this time, the river was not flat but there was a drop-off where the softer mud had been washed off. The bus assistant jumped down and started throwing rocks to the edge of the drop-off to kinda patch up the ground to make it more solid for our side wheels to go through.

Again, I did not breathe as the bus driver steered towards the river, carefully, aiming the right wheels on the solid rocks. Even clearing this section, the road up ahead had several undulating humps and you can just never be sure when the back wheels might get stuck. Oh, what a scary ride!!!

It took us nearly 8 hours to get to Cochabamba. Hooray, we live! I really take my hat off to the driver!

We took a colectivo to go to the bus terminal but it was stuck in the traffic near the market area for more than 1 hour. We were nearly faint with hunger as we had eaten nothing today. Renaud got off the bus to buy us some cheese snacks to tide us through. When I sort-of knew where we were, we got off and started walking.

Cochabamba had also been raining and everywhere in the market area were puddles and puddles of brown dirty water. But the people, in order to clear their own personal spaces, pushed the water away with brooms. Gosh, there was absolutely NO drainage here, or there was drainage, but all the rubbish had choked everything up! So the water was just being splashed from left to right and back!!

I bought my ticket to Santa Cruz leaving tonight. I was a little generous with myself today. I bought a fancy bus-cama seat, for US$3 more. After the harrowing ride today, I think I deserve it. I hope it is a good bus. Although I was famished, I knew that if I eat any of the oily food now, I would just throw up. So, I started my first proper food intake of today at 5pm with a bowl of fruit salad.

And after whiling the night away, I got onto the hmmm… not too bad… bus to Santa Cruz, scheduled to leave at 9:30pm but actually left at 10:10pm. They played Titantic… that’s a 3+ hour movie! I put on my ear-plugs and fell asleep soon. I hope, this time, they do not lose my backpack!

16 November 2005 (Wednesday) – Cochabamba to Parque Nacional Torotoro, Bolivia

Naoki and I met up and headed to the bus station of the private bus company going to Torotoro and bought our tickets. Gosh, to be honest, the area looked downright dodgy. I wonder what we are in for tonight.

Later in the afternoon, I happened to check my email and found that a French guy named Renaud had emailed to me, saying that he wants to go to Torotoro as well. He was staying at one of the two hostels where I had left a note at. Great! Another companion! But he had said he would wait for me at his hostel at 9am. Of course, I completely missed that appointment. So, I wrote to tell him to meet us – a Chinese girl and a Japanese guy – at Plaza 14 de septiembre at 5pm.

At 5pm, Naoki and I were waiting at the plaza when I spotted a guy who had a piece of paper in his hand and seemed to be searching for someone. OK, this has got to be Renaud. But the chap walked right past us! I chased after him and tried to call his name. But gosh, I realised I did not know how to pronounce it! Argh… I had had 9 months of French lessons just before I came on this trip. But 4+ months of travelling in Spanish-speaking countries had clean-wiped everything off. Later, when his head finally turned somewhere towards us, I waved at him and he smiled and came over.

We introduced each other and he said that he was really keen to go, but he had to get his things ready now. We agreed to meet him later at a cafe for some salteñas before we leave. Finally, there, we chatted (or rather, just Renaud and I chatted, as we could not communicate with Naoki at all) and I asked him if he went to Pasteleria Sofia last night. Well, Renaud had been wondering how to go to Torotoro the whole of Tuesday. Finally, at 8:35pm, he approached the reception in his hostel to ask for information and the guy showed him my note. I had stated I would wait for whoever til 8:30pm. So, by the time he hurried there, I had just left. He even went in and asked the waiter if there had been a Chinese girl sitting in the cafe for a while. Yep, they said, but she left. Hahaha… So, my note almost worked!

We arrived at the bus station at around 7pm. Oh my goodness… something was not quite right! There were massive massive massive numbers of campesinos there… way too many to fit into a bus. And, there were massive massive massive sacks of potatoes, onions, flour, tomatoes, oranges, etc… impossible to fit into a bus. What was going on?

Soon, a gigantic truck pulled up and loads of people started heaving the sacks of produces (perhaps weighing up to 90kg each) onto the truck. This exercise took more than an hour, but when it was nearly full with the goods, several of the campesinos climbed onto the truck to sit on top of the produces. Oh, they were going the ‘truck’ way. Tough, especially the ride is 8 hours through very harsh roads!

Our bus that was supposed to leave at 7pm only showed up at around 8:30pm. The rest of the campesinos and locals who had not climbed onto the truck, surged to the bus and pushed and shoved to clamber on. Although Renaud had just arrived, he actually managed to buy a ticket. But we wondered how it was possible!

Naoki and I got to our seats 1 and 2 safely. But Renaud was seated at the door exit. The campesinos had filled up the entire bus, and then, laden the aisle with more sacks of potatoes and onions. People were stepping on Renaud’s lap to get across.

The place next to the driver which covered the hot engine, sat 3 or 4 people. 2 more were sitting on the dashboard. And these were the lucky ones! For several more people were standing at the back, trying to sit on the canisters of gas stoves and sacks of goods. Women with babies were amongst these people as well.

A terribly ancient man was trying to sit on something on the aisle. Renaud felt compassionate and wanted to offer his seat to him, but the ticket lady snapped at Renaud to stay where he was because it was HIS seat. I guess, some people chose to go the aisle way as the non-existing ‘seats’ there were cheaper. That explained why Renaud managed to get a ticket at this time!

A quarrel ensued when a guy refused to let another put his sack of potatoes in front which actually would land right on top of this guy’s feet. So, a hefty campesina, with her baby strapped to her, agreed to stand up to let the sack of potatoes be moved there, so that sack now became her seat. It was impossible!!! This was NOT REAL! I mean, I had talked about collectivos being squeezed to the extreme by the locals but those were for short distances. This was for an 8-hour overnight journey!

And when I mean ‘hefty’, I do mean it. The women in this region wear a knee-length velvety pleated skirt that seemed to have an underwire around the hip area to make the hip even wider, which based on their greasy intake and number of babies produced per woman, were already wide enough. They also wear wide-rimmed hats with ribbons that in a crowded situation like now, really got in the way of everything and everyone.

But somehow or other, when everyone had settled down, where every single inch was filled with a butt, a baby, an onion, a toe… the bus moved off at 9:10pm. Great! But after a mere half an hour of careening on the highway, we came to a toll-booth and somehow the police stopped the bus and there were exchanges in Quechua (this region once again speaks Quechua) and I heard ‘coca’ several times. The police was checking for coca leaves. I supposed everyone here has their own personal stash. So, the police must be searching for massive bags of coca leaves intended for illegal activities like, I don’t know, brewing Coca-Cola. Loads of people dislodged from their respective seats and squeezed spots and got down to talk to the police. Perhaps, several even had to unload their goods from the top of the bus or from the aisle for inspection.

This dance happened for about 45 minutes before everyone piled back in again and we moved on again. Guiltily, I peered at Naoki and Renaud. Oh gosh, what had I gotten both of them into?, I wonder. This was the most horrible and yet the most interesting bus-ride I had taken in a while! But both of them were good-humoured at this point, as it was also a chance for them to experience this way of travelling with the campesinos. Forget about bus-cama (fancy buses with seats that leaned nearly all the way down), this was upright sleeping (if you can) for the next bumpy 8 hours.

At around 1am, we had a flat. Of course, we had to have this flat. This is a classic! What is a nightmare bus-ride without a flat tyre in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night?

15 November 2005 (Tuesday) - Cochabamba, Bolivia Nice to be able to sleep in this morning for I have nothing to do today, save for a candle-making course later in the afternoon. I know... candle-making course, you asked?? Am I retired or ... [Continue reading this entry]

14 November 2005 (Monday) - Cochabamba, Bolivia The minute the words 'Parque Nacional Torotoro' came out of my mouth, the Tourist Office lady shoved me some brochures and seemed to wave me away, telling me everything is in there. Only from ... [Continue reading this entry]

13 November 2005 (Sunday) - Cochabamba, Bolivia I arrived in Cochabamba at around 6am to find my backpack NOT on the bus. Well, there was a fancier bus leaving La Paz at 10pm and then, there was my normal bus ... [Continue reading this entry]