From Sucre to Potosi

 I took a 9:30 am bus from Sucre to arrive at Potosí around 1:00 am. There were good views during the bus ride. Ootosi, at around 4000 metres, is one of the world's highest cities. I got off the bus earlier with most of the passengers when I noticed that stop is closer to the hostel than the big bus terminal. 

I tried to walk 1.5 miles to the hostel, but I felt my heavy breathing at 4000 meters. I asked a local lady to identify a bus to go to the city center. The traffic was quite congested so the ride took a while yet I can tour the city on the local bus. 

The rain kicked in after I checked in the hostel. There were only three people staying in the hostel today. I still toured the town in rain and met my friend at his hostel to discuss the best plan to cope with the 10/19 Election Day (no public transportation).  His hostel had few more guests but the weather here is bad. We decided to bus to Uyuni tomorrow afternoon. 

Potosí was founded in 1546 after the discovery of the rich silver deposits in the Cerro Rico. It soon became one of the wealthiest and largest cites in the Americas. Some of this wealth was used to build magnificent baroque churches (UNESCO listed sites) and monasteries. The miners were often below ground for weeks at a time. In 1800 the silver mines were depleted and tin became the major ore mined. Recently they are mining rare earths. All of this lead to a slow economic decline.

Beside the square and the central market, I walked in the Casa Nacional de Moneda, which was the former royal mint, but now houses one of the better museums in South America. It housed the mint responsible for producing silver coins that made the Spanish Empire rich and changed the world's economy. The building is a symbol of the immense wealth that flowed from the city, funded by the labor of thousands of indigenous and enslaved people. I photoed with the mask in the courtyard, a carved stone representation of the Roman god Bacchus, the god of wine, revelry, and excess. Installed in 1865, it is often viewed as a symbol of irony regarding the departure of the Spanish from Bolivia.

Although most travelers come here for the mine tour, but I skip the mine tour for the poor air quality and life. The legacy of Potosí's colonial past is still felt in the city today. The mining industry is still active, with locals still going to the mines to extract what silver remains, facing the same dangerous conditions as their ancestors.