Caving... and some civil engineering on the side

This past weekend, I went for an adventure in Torotoro with seven other volunteers. Adventure is what we got. Torotoro is a town, and a National Park by the same name,  about 100 miles (as the crow flies) from Cochabamba. The park is known for its caves, canyons, and dinosaur footprints.  Tourists are delivered there on a bright yellow bus painted with dinosaurs. The one way ticket costs 20Bs (just under $3) Locals ride this bus too, and there must be some price differential, because we all got seats, but many of the Bolivians sit in the aisles, on the steps, or even on the dashboard of the bus. To cover the distance between Cochabamba and Torotoro, the big yellow dinosaur bus takes about 6 hours, on a good day. So I'm told.

Our bus there had two runners (small boys that stand the whole ride by the door and jump out to move the biggest landslides that block the road, then jump back on while the bus is still moving), we only got one flat tire from side-swiping a landslide, and we made the trip in just under 7 hours.



We arrived in the pouring rain and awoke the next morning at a trashy hostel in the pouring rain and generally had an overall negative attitude about the prospects of the weekend.  Then we tracked down our guide, Mario, at his house. Mario is the short, silent type and has been guiding in the region since either 1969 or 1979 (I'm still having trouble with numbers in Spanish).  He took us past dinosaur tracks and into the caves. Because of the rain, the water thundering through the caverns was deafening, and all the surfaces were slippery. Mario worked with only one climbing rope and a propane fueled flame on the front of his helmet. We climbed and descended and squeezed through tiny tunnels. I am certain that insurance companies in the United States wouldn't even let you look at the cave entrance, but, for a nominal fee, Mario adeptly guided us underground for hours. It was incredible. The most impressive thing about Mario, short of keeping us alive, was that while we slithered and squeezed through water and mud and dirt, Mario never got a speck of dirt on the dress pants and white shirt that he guides in.

















On the second day, Mario showed us the canyons and waterfalls that decorate Torotoro park. We hiked 1000 steps (or so) to the base of the canyon, drank in the views and climbed on boulders. Again, the water-carved landscape was marvelous.

When it was time to go home, we paid another 20Bs for the dinosaur bus and boarded at 3pm. We stopped for a bunch of Sunday market traffic in the nearby villages. After 2 hours of driving, we got stuck in the first river we came to. (Oh, of course I forgot to mention that the road just goes through rivers.) The drop from the road into the current was decent sized, and the rear end of the bus got hung up. The people in the truck behind us got out and started to dig. They got annoyed at me for taking pictures, so I got out to help them. I waded through the river to the back of the bus, and with the shovel, crowbar, and pick ax (apparently standard issue gear for Bolivian buses), we tried to work the back end free. A mini traffic jam formed behind us including 2 trucks and a herd of goats. Our bus driver did not want to get wet, so he went back and forth through the aisle of the bus and climbed in and out of the back window, using his runner's back as a step ladder.

Meanwhile, someone decided that the water was the problem and convinced the rest of my gringo group to build a dam to reroute the river. I don't know what is funnier: that someone thought we could change the course of a raging current and that it would somehow help the situation; or, that they actually convinced us to try. So, I moved up river to join my group of friends in hauling big rocks into the middle of the stream. A couple small boys from the bus came to help, and asked us to pay them for their services. We didn't. Meanwhile, the number of other passengers seemed to somehow be slowly diminishing. It got dark.

After about four hours of futile attempts to move the bus or the river, another bus arrived and pulled us free. We climbed on board and rounded the first bend in the road to discover where the other passengers had gone: to the bar in the town a mere 200 yards up the road. We had been too busy altering the landscape to look for the nearest place to buy a beer.

We drove for another hour in the dark, all drifting to sleep after our backbreaking dam building work. At about 10pm, we came to another river. Our bus stopped. The engine was shut off. Not a good sign. In the middle of the river (which was, in this case, the road) was a large truck, buried up to its axles in mud and rock, effectively blocking all traffic. Our busdriver decided to just go to sleep until morning and laid down in the bus' baggage compartment.

Another bus, from Cochabamba, arrived on the other side of the river. Yucca and Sheylynn, my only companions that were awake, tried to convince the drivers to trade passengers and go back from whence they came. Everyone wins, and we all get home tonight, right? Our driver said 'no.'

Not accepting of the 'sleep it off' solution to river crossing, us three girls, along with two other passengers from our bus decided to build a ramp down the one meter river bank, bypassing the truck. It was a big project to attempt, let alone with simple tools (remember: shovel, pick ax, & crowbar), limited workers, and pitch darkness, but at least it wasn't raining.

We started carrying rocks, shoveling, and breaking shale off a nearby cliff face. The rest of the men from the buses, along with our drivers, stood laughing at us. But after about a half hour, you could see the machismo kick in from watching girls do manual labor. One at a time, we got the manpower we needed.

At around 1am, the bus on the other side managed to reposition itself to pull the truck out of the river. They managed to free it, but only to wedge it again, this time right in front of our ramp. But, after a few more attempts, the truck was pulled to the opposite bank just as we completed our engineering feat.

The bus from the other side crossed via the old road, but our driver didn't want to attempt it, for fear of getting stuck like the truck. He went for the ramp. It was bumpy, but operational. (ramp under the back wheels of the bus in this photo) A few men stayed outside and helped shove us through the river.

At 2am, we were across the river, just after 4am, we reached Cochabamba. I couldn't find my ticket to produce for collection upon de-boarding. I didn't feel bad about that. At 5am, I reached my bed. Today, my arms are sore. It's either from caving, or dam building, or road engineering... but, enough about 'vacationing', it's time to go back to school building.