ON BOARD "LA JOYA DEL PACÍFICO" ACROSS THE BOLIVIAN CHACO.

The "Jewel of the Pacific" was the name of the Volvo F-12 truck I hitched a ride with from Tarija to Entre Ríos. It was my first long ride in Bolivia, a ride that proved me that not all drivers in Bolivia ask for money. On the contrary, this was one of the most amazing rides of my life. Overnight, I slpet inside the cargo of the truck, that was taking 10 tons of bottles of Coca Cola. Just in case I get thirsty...

Guido, the driver, was worthy of the interview I accomplish during the long ride. He had studied Engineering in Argentina but forced to quit due to his political activities during the 1976-1983 dictatorship. He then came back to Bolivia where he was also doomed to hide from the local military, so he stayed in a monastery disguised as priest for two years!

Landscape from the truck's cabin.

We have breakfast in Entre Rios town, and I am on my own again, ready to take an almost invisible, dirty road and explore the back country.

BOLIVIA BEYOND THE SYMBOLIC

The scene takes place in Tarija. One of my aims while in Bolivia is to find out the concrete and real effects of the changes introduced by Evo Morales beyond the symbolic dimension. It's true he has vindicated the native people, the rights of the indigenous communities. During my trip I will try listn from this people of their lifestyle and economy have improved as well. I have no prejudices or suspicions. Just a writer in search of reality beyond headlines.

Another all together different challenge for me was hitch-hiking in Bolivia. I was honestly sure if it was going to work. Odds were aganist me and the traditional comment about Bolivia is that all drivers and trucks ask for money. However, I found out that backpackers in Bolivia take the bus right away and don't make any attempt to hitch-hike. They assume hitch-hiking is impossible just because bus fares are really cheap. In the picture, a 1948 Willys Jeep that gave me a ride from Tarija. It's my personal record of antiquity.

Tarija is one of the richest cities of Bolivia and that's where I found this Hummer...

Cholita is the word that designates women from the countryside in the Andean world.

Globalized world: a Colombian black metal band in concert in Tarija. The organizer of the event was my Cuchsurfing host.

Chapacos is how the people from Tarija province call themselves. Here a man chewing coca leaves...

Markets are the soul of Bolivian cities. Also, they a re a cheap place for travellers to eat healthy food.

Tarija prefecture was about to celebrate elections. Conservative sectors were afraid the Evo Morales lead MAS (Movement towards Socialism) would gain more power in a traditionally autonomous region.

I am really jelaous of the Bolivians. They have cheap food almost everywhere meanwhile in Argentina we ecport food to the resto of the world but going out for dinner is a luxury. I prefer countries were food is conceived in a humble way as a necessity and it's not overprized.

HUNTING FOR HORIZONS AND ABSURDITY IN THE YUNGAS

Travelling is the eternal chase of the horizon. Horizon could fairly be the name of a wounded animal that leaves its tracks... After such prey I left Andalgalá, Argentina towards the Bolivian border across Tucumán, Salta and Jujuy provinces. On the picture: La Maga portrayed with a tank of holy water while camping in the church of Bermejo, Bolivia.

Loaded with tree trunks this Ford F-100 pick up gave me a lift from Andalgalá to Aconquija, across the Cuesta de Chilca.

Landscape in the Cuesta de Chilca, Catamarca Province.

My driver from Concepción to San Miguel de Tucumán in the company of a goose, and with his Renault Megane in the back.

Charly and Diego, two fellow hitch-hikers who hosted me in San Miguel de Tucumán.

Tucumán city is really poles apart from the expectations of colonial city many travellers harbour.

Murga taking place during a sexual tolerance rally in Tucumán.

Hitching a ride in a school bus taking the children home after classes in Guemes, Salta Province, Argentina.

Member of the road construction team using a theodolite, near Pampa Blanca. Jujuy Province.

Border corssing from Aguas Blanca (Argentina) to Bermejo (Bolivia)

Yungas is the name of the high altitude jungle sprawling from Northenrn Argentina into Bolivia.... There go my steps.

PEOPLE RISE THEIR FISTS IN ANDALGALÁ, "A SACRIFICE ZONE"

Andalgalá is the polemic town that recently hit the news after thousand of poeple manifested against Yamana Gold and Agua Rica project. Gold is being extracted from nearby Mina La Alumbrera for a decade already. Now, new projects menace the region, already hitted by draught, water pollution and social tensions. In the pictures, you can see how the offices of Yamana Gold looked like the morning after citizens smashed windows in a justified protest.

Urbano Cardozo doesn´t smash windows, but has been working hard for years to rise awareness of the matter. He had people from the mine visiting his house with a blank check, inviting him to pen an ammount, and choose the number of zeros... Loyal to the cause, he kept working and organizing citizen awareness.

This woman came every day to my "office" (a room Urbano had lent me in order to carry one my investigation) and offered me quince jelly she prepares herself in her patio....

Foto de una foto. Operarios de la mina retiran como pueden del río los minerales pesados derramados.


All across Andalgalá area, six licks in the mine mineral pipelines that transports heavy metals have already been confirmed. Five of them in Villa Vil and one in Ampujaco. In the picture you can see a lick in Villa Lola, Tucumán Province. The mine payed unqualified workers to just collect the hazardous metals in plastic bags, as if they were handling mud...

Foxes around La Alumbrera mine are reported to loose their skin...

The Algarrobo Assembly, where people gather to exchange advise on how to keep the struggle against such powerful companies. While the mine have their sociologists and experts working in their Canada and Anrgentina based headquarters, poeple gather under a tree. What could bee more genuine and coherent? The Assembly also doubles as roadblock for mining trucks to enter the are of Agua Rica project.

Andalgalá town hall, parcially burned by the manifesting crowed. Absolutely deserved by a major who has nicked enviromentalists as "hippies" as if this alone would be threatening. Medieval thought still prevails across political class in Catamarca, it seems.

HOST TO INVISIBLE PARTIES

La Maga - my backpack- waiting by the roadside in Londres, a small town in Catamarca Province, curiously named after a Tudor wedding in the XVII century.

Antonio Avar, skilfull tapesry maker from Belén, another famous town in the region. His family hosted my for two nights.

On the way to Andalgala, town which is sit of the resistance against La Alumbrera Gold Mine.

I would sit in a park to share a piece of bread, if I would ever find a soulmate sensible to the beauty of the open road. I was very close to finding it, but I didn`t know that.

At a place called Chumbiche, I camped in a park and lighted a cigar, a gift from a journalist friend of mine from Buenos Aires. I put some Bacanic music in my netbook. I semed a hostt to an invisble party. I was curious how would the scene evolve would a policeman arrive to check my documents....

From Chumbicha to Mutkin, I got a ride in this 1960 Jeep. The guy was manager of the provincial gas company.

TINOGASTA FORGES ITS OWN JUSTICE

Tinogasta is a large town in arid Catamarca Province, where locals struggle to keep mining companies away from extracting uranium in the region. Roadblocks and rallies are common. IN the picture, a classical Argentinean pick up, flag, and a "pava" (teapot to boil water for mate)

Image of the town center, where life seems to carry on, while the threat is always there, underneath your feet.

As in the rest of the mining provinces, the problem is deep and has to do with possible models of development. Catamarca certainly existed before mining boom. Other activities such as agriculture (olive) are gradually loosing their reputation as key factors for economy development. Also, undescriminate social benefit programs are a factory of laziness. Most people just live day by day by stretching their assigned budget, and don´t work the land as eagerly as their ancestors.

Trucks in direction to La Alumbrerra mine being blocked by local enviromentalists in Tinogasta.

The mine trucks attempt to organize a counter-block. But the Army inmediatly ordered them to return to their possitions.

Six thousand people manifested against uranium industry some months ago.... Amazingly, the students who are taught the goverment is the one responsioble for watching over the citizens rights are now the ones reminding them their job.

MOTORHOMES, WORKER`S CLASS EXTREME SPORTS AND THE GOLD UNDERNEATH THE POOR`S FEET

The motorhome where I lived for a week in Pedro`s house. It`s a luxury to perform sedentary life for a week in an icon of movement.

It seems I am specializing in developing a worker class version of extreme sports. In the picture, after rafting down Jachal River in truck tyres, using old brushes as rows.

Medical check for La Maga… In a scale from 1885 it weighted 18,5 Kg.... more than it should, but the consider I am carrying all materials needed for binding my boks and framing the postcards I sell to sustain this trip.

Mud brick houses and superb rural landscape at Pampa Vieja.

Jorge took me in his Ford Taunus to Nonogasta. And he did so despite his car was falling apart. Indeed, we lost the exhaust in one of the bends....

Norht of Chilecito, the landscape turns barren, the town sparced... It is an untravelled road to Tinogasta in Catamarca. This obsession for following the tiniest lines in the roadmaps leads to being stuck in remote places. Which is something I love....

In Potrerilllos I am invited home by a local family. Antonio, the boy in the picture, rides his bike which has no tyres or breaks. He rides it over the pavement, making a terrible noise indeed. I am invited to drink mate and camp by his home. It is hard to believe that amazing reserves of gold lie just underneath Antonio`s poverty, the gold that is extracted by foreign companies and forges the offficial reserves of Swiss Banks, for example. In Latin America little has changed over the last 500 years.