ExploringRTW
Registered user
10 July to 11 July
After the trip we went back to the hotel to pack then a quick lunch at the Joyrider café to say goodbye to all and head off to Potosi. We had previously completed the ride from Potosi to Sucre in the dark so it was good to enjoy the road in the day to with the rolling hills slowly rising until we reach the highest city in the world, Potosi, at 4062m.
We had arranged to meet Katrin and Ralf in town but we somehow had caught them up on the approach to town, so we all arrived in town together, found a hotel for the night with heating, arranged a trip to the infamous mine and had dinner.
We were up early the next day and at the tour company by 8:00 and on the tour bus within 10 minutes. We had chosen a tour company that employed ex-miners and also gave part of our tour money back to the mining community, as after injury or just an accident; there is no support outside of the family for anyone.
We were quickly taken to a place to get our gear for the mines, over suits, hard hats and Wellington boots...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337269.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The hardened miners ready for the day!!!
And then we were on our way to the miners market. Here our guide 'Pedro Negro' gave us a quick introduction to the way the mine works and there habits. I'll just give a brief overview to give an impression of the way they live and work.
The miner’s food in the mine consists of chewing Coca leaves, drinking gallons of fizzy drinks. They do not consume food during the day, as they do not come up to the surface and the amount of dust and noxious gases absorbed into the food would seriously affect their health!
The mines are not owned by any corporations. They are either mined by individuals or small collectives. And the more ore they move in day the more money they make. So they will only leave the mine when they have too.
Underground the workers have a hierarchical structure which starts with the people who push the trolleys, full of ore to supervisors who have been miners for 20 to 30 years. Once a miner becomes a supervisor they have the option to run a collective, start one of their own, or go it alone!
There are no rules on the control of selling or buying dynamite in Bolivia. Often in demonstrations dynamite will be thrown towards government officials or the roads will have holes blasted in them. Down the mine 'turf wars' sometimes escalate to such a level the miners will throw dynamite at each other!!!!
After the talk which shocked us a bit to how harsh it all seemed we were asked to buy gifts for the miners from the market, which were sticks of dynamite, detonators, fuses, fizzy drinks and coca leaves.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337284.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The miners market
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337279.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
A few small bags of Coca leaves for sale!!!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337291.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Our guide for the day....help!!!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337288.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And what was in his mouth and hands....
Once full of gifts we were back on the bus and taken to the processing plants. I was assuming not a new industrial process but something that was once designed by professionals but once I got there I had a huge shock. It looked like a dodgy mechanics workshop.
The ore was piled up in a large heap. Men were shovelling the fine ore into wheel barrows to be added to the extraction process. The larger rocks were man handled to one side where they will be crushed.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337349.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The ore crusher...
The fine grit was shovelled into a cylindrical barrel full of iron balls which pound the ore into a very fine paste
The paste is mixed with water and then mixed with chemicals. The chemical mixture processing plant was a Heath Robinson affair with numerous trays with little rotating buckets made of bottle top lids! Mixing different chemicals most of which should have been in sealed environments.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337345.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The chemical mixing process...
These chemicals were on a slow drip into the final processing (For Bolivia anyway) where they caused the metals (Silver, zinc, tin etc) to float to the surface.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337341.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The 'pure' metals being skimmed off...
At the surface these are skimmed off with the lighter weight rock dust and are dried in the sun. The metal and rock paste is then exported to UK, USA etc. The rest of the spoil and chemicals head for the river...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337275.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The drying of the concentrated ore...
After this tour we were taken to the mine by bus.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337340.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The mine...
Outside we were issued with lamps for the helmets and we were led into the mine after waiting for the new battery powered ore truck to drop off and disappear down the mine.
Down the mine is also a subjective comment. Potosi is at over 4000m above sea level and the mine is in the mountain at the back of the town which is even higher. So in reality we were still over 4000m above sea level and above the town but a few hundred feet down the mine!!!
Given the basic conditions of the processing the main tunnel was at a comparable level. The tunnel was as you would expect dark but the power and compressed air lines for the hammer drills and ad-hoc lighting was barely attached to the walls and hung in big loops.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337306.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The main Tunnel...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337335.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Miners taking the train down!
About 40m into the mine there was a small excavation to one side which housed a museum. There were few artefacts there but a lot about the history of the mine which had been in production since the Spanish invasion of Bolivia. The one of the most horrific is the statistic of two million deaths in the mine during the Spanish occupation. Most of these deaths were black slaves imported by the Spanish from the Congo. Apart from the obvious abuse these slaves suffered that is commonly documented, they suffered further at Potosi due to the 4000m + altitude and the cold. Their shift down the mine was 6 months at a time if they lived that long.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337332.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
All waiting anxiously after the museum tour
After the museum tour we were lead further down the mine to a point where the ore is lifted from one level to another.
We crawled through a tiny hole in the side of the tunnel and up and across a few meters until we made it into a hole about 5 m across and 3 m high. In here was a man on his own constantly emptying rubber buckets, coming from the lower levels of the mine, which weigh 250 kg into a small hole under which the ore tuck will be pushed. Above him, in the same hole, supported on a wooden platform are the winch man & the winch. The winch does not stop as soon as a rubber bucket is raised; an empty one is attached and sent down again. The guy emptying the buckets has to complete the task before the next one comes up!
After a short time here and me helping him to empty a couple of buckets we head off again down the mine to the lover levels but before we leave we donate some of our gifts which are the sugary soft drinks!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337326.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Tunnel to the hoisting area
We are lead through a number of small shafts which you slide down on hands and knees until we reach the next level (Level 2). Here we have a break for a few minutes and give some more of our gifts, Coca leaves to a guy who pushes the wagons and some dynamite to a co-operative supervisor who has gone it alone to find his fortune.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337320.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
A little dust in the air!!!!
After the break we climb down further shafts before we reach a point with a wooden shoot. Here we are shown how to slide down the last 5 m to the 3rd level. This is the final level for us as a tour but the mine goes down a further 15 and the routes down are the same as we have taken for the first three.
In the third level we are taken to the guys who fill the ore buckets to be lifted up. Before we reach there we have to stand aside for ore trucks delivering the ore to the lifting area. The trucks down here weigh 2 tonnes when filled and are pushed by three guys; the youngest of who we met was 15. At one point on their route to the drop off point the track goes around the bend, but on the corner of the bend the track is missing and a piece of rock is used to guide the wagon. Every truck that passes de rails. The three guys then struggle to get the two tonne truck back on the tracks before charging off. Some more of our gifts are given to the guys pushing the trucks, everything down the mine is completed as quickly as possible as stated earlier everyone is paid by the amount of ore moved!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337319.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Moving the fully laden2 tonne trucks...
We eventually get to the two guys shovelling the ore. They also have a 5 m area with a rail track coming in on one side. The rest of the space was used as an emptying zone for the ore from the wagons.
The buckets are shovelled in as quickly as possible before going up. We all have a go and the work is hard and hot let alone working 12 hours a day plus at it.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337314.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Some of the tour group and the miners shovelling the ore into the buckets...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337309.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And Mike...
We donate the last of our gifts before starting our exit from the mine. The route out was the same as the route in so we have to crawl up the tunnels and shafts we clambered down. There were fewer stops on the way up and with all the heat and dust we were soaked to the skin by the time we made it to the final stretch of tunnel. As we wandered towards the exit and we could see day light we heard the call for the electric train coming back into the tunnel. We were at a narrow part so Mike and I had to run back down until we could find an alcove each to stand in until the train had passed. Finally we made it out!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337302.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The survivors...
Once out side the fun was not over. Our guide, along with three other guides, who were all ex-miner, had kept some dynamite, detonator and a bag of ammonium nitrate.
The dynamite was rolled into a ball, the detonator pushed in and the dynamite put in the bag of ammonium nitrate.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337298.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The dynamite...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338388.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
With Fuse...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338382.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
With Ammonium Nitrate...
The fuses were lit and they ran off to a clear area and left the charges before running back.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338376.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And burning...
We have a video of the results and if we find a way to post it we'll add it in!
After the final piece of excitement we were shipped back into town the protective gear handed back and we headed off for some lunch and a well earned beer before retiring for the day...
John
After the trip we went back to the hotel to pack then a quick lunch at the Joyrider café to say goodbye to all and head off to Potosi. We had previously completed the ride from Potosi to Sucre in the dark so it was good to enjoy the road in the day to with the rolling hills slowly rising until we reach the highest city in the world, Potosi, at 4062m.
We had arranged to meet Katrin and Ralf in town but we somehow had caught them up on the approach to town, so we all arrived in town together, found a hotel for the night with heating, arranged a trip to the infamous mine and had dinner.
We were up early the next day and at the tour company by 8:00 and on the tour bus within 10 minutes. We had chosen a tour company that employed ex-miners and also gave part of our tour money back to the mining community, as after injury or just an accident; there is no support outside of the family for anyone.
We were quickly taken to a place to get our gear for the mines, over suits, hard hats and Wellington boots...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337269.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The hardened miners ready for the day!!!
And then we were on our way to the miners market. Here our guide 'Pedro Negro' gave us a quick introduction to the way the mine works and there habits. I'll just give a brief overview to give an impression of the way they live and work.
The miner’s food in the mine consists of chewing Coca leaves, drinking gallons of fizzy drinks. They do not consume food during the day, as they do not come up to the surface and the amount of dust and noxious gases absorbed into the food would seriously affect their health!
The mines are not owned by any corporations. They are either mined by individuals or small collectives. And the more ore they move in day the more money they make. So they will only leave the mine when they have too.
Underground the workers have a hierarchical structure which starts with the people who push the trolleys, full of ore to supervisors who have been miners for 20 to 30 years. Once a miner becomes a supervisor they have the option to run a collective, start one of their own, or go it alone!
There are no rules on the control of selling or buying dynamite in Bolivia. Often in demonstrations dynamite will be thrown towards government officials or the roads will have holes blasted in them. Down the mine 'turf wars' sometimes escalate to such a level the miners will throw dynamite at each other!!!!
After the talk which shocked us a bit to how harsh it all seemed we were asked to buy gifts for the miners from the market, which were sticks of dynamite, detonators, fuses, fizzy drinks and coca leaves.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337284.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The miners market
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337279.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
A few small bags of Coca leaves for sale!!!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337291.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Our guide for the day....help!!!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337288.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And what was in his mouth and hands....
Once full of gifts we were back on the bus and taken to the processing plants. I was assuming not a new industrial process but something that was once designed by professionals but once I got there I had a huge shock. It looked like a dodgy mechanics workshop.
The ore was piled up in a large heap. Men were shovelling the fine ore into wheel barrows to be added to the extraction process. The larger rocks were man handled to one side where they will be crushed.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337349.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The ore crusher...
The fine grit was shovelled into a cylindrical barrel full of iron balls which pound the ore into a very fine paste
The paste is mixed with water and then mixed with chemicals. The chemical mixture processing plant was a Heath Robinson affair with numerous trays with little rotating buckets made of bottle top lids! Mixing different chemicals most of which should have been in sealed environments.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337345.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The chemical mixing process...
These chemicals were on a slow drip into the final processing (For Bolivia anyway) where they caused the metals (Silver, zinc, tin etc) to float to the surface.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337341.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The 'pure' metals being skimmed off...
At the surface these are skimmed off with the lighter weight rock dust and are dried in the sun. The metal and rock paste is then exported to UK, USA etc. The rest of the spoil and chemicals head for the river...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337275.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The drying of the concentrated ore...
After this tour we were taken to the mine by bus.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337340.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The mine...
Outside we were issued with lamps for the helmets and we were led into the mine after waiting for the new battery powered ore truck to drop off and disappear down the mine.
Down the mine is also a subjective comment. Potosi is at over 4000m above sea level and the mine is in the mountain at the back of the town which is even higher. So in reality we were still over 4000m above sea level and above the town but a few hundred feet down the mine!!!
Given the basic conditions of the processing the main tunnel was at a comparable level. The tunnel was as you would expect dark but the power and compressed air lines for the hammer drills and ad-hoc lighting was barely attached to the walls and hung in big loops.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337306.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The main Tunnel...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337335.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Miners taking the train down!
About 40m into the mine there was a small excavation to one side which housed a museum. There were few artefacts there but a lot about the history of the mine which had been in production since the Spanish invasion of Bolivia. The one of the most horrific is the statistic of two million deaths in the mine during the Spanish occupation. Most of these deaths were black slaves imported by the Spanish from the Congo. Apart from the obvious abuse these slaves suffered that is commonly documented, they suffered further at Potosi due to the 4000m + altitude and the cold. Their shift down the mine was 6 months at a time if they lived that long.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337332.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
All waiting anxiously after the museum tour
After the museum tour we were lead further down the mine to a point where the ore is lifted from one level to another.
We crawled through a tiny hole in the side of the tunnel and up and across a few meters until we made it into a hole about 5 m across and 3 m high. In here was a man on his own constantly emptying rubber buckets, coming from the lower levels of the mine, which weigh 250 kg into a small hole under which the ore tuck will be pushed. Above him, in the same hole, supported on a wooden platform are the winch man & the winch. The winch does not stop as soon as a rubber bucket is raised; an empty one is attached and sent down again. The guy emptying the buckets has to complete the task before the next one comes up!
After a short time here and me helping him to empty a couple of buckets we head off again down the mine to the lover levels but before we leave we donate some of our gifts which are the sugary soft drinks!!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337326.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Tunnel to the hoisting area
We are lead through a number of small shafts which you slide down on hands and knees until we reach the next level (Level 2). Here we have a break for a few minutes and give some more of our gifts, Coca leaves to a guy who pushes the wagons and some dynamite to a co-operative supervisor who has gone it alone to find his fortune.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337320.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
A little dust in the air!!!!
After the break we climb down further shafts before we reach a point with a wooden shoot. Here we are shown how to slide down the last 5 m to the 3rd level. This is the final level for us as a tour but the mine goes down a further 15 and the routes down are the same as we have taken for the first three.
In the third level we are taken to the guys who fill the ore buckets to be lifted up. Before we reach there we have to stand aside for ore trucks delivering the ore to the lifting area. The trucks down here weigh 2 tonnes when filled and are pushed by three guys; the youngest of who we met was 15. At one point on their route to the drop off point the track goes around the bend, but on the corner of the bend the track is missing and a piece of rock is used to guide the wagon. Every truck that passes de rails. The three guys then struggle to get the two tonne truck back on the tracks before charging off. Some more of our gifts are given to the guys pushing the trucks, everything down the mine is completed as quickly as possible as stated earlier everyone is paid by the amount of ore moved!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337319.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Moving the fully laden2 tonne trucks...
We eventually get to the two guys shovelling the ore. They also have a 5 m area with a rail track coming in on one side. The rest of the space was used as an emptying zone for the ore from the wagons.
The buckets are shovelled in as quickly as possible before going up. We all have a go and the work is hard and hot let alone working 12 hours a day plus at it.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337314.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
Some of the tour group and the miners shovelling the ore into the buckets...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337309.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And Mike...
We donate the last of our gifts before starting our exit from the mine. The route out was the same as the route in so we have to crawl up the tunnels and shafts we clambered down. There were fewer stops on the way up and with all the heat and dust we were soaked to the skin by the time we made it to the final stretch of tunnel. As we wandered towards the exit and we could see day light we heard the call for the electric train coming back into the tunnel. We were at a narrow part so Mike and I had to run back down until we could find an alcove each to stand in until the train had passed. Finally we made it out!
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337302.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The survivors...
Once out side the fun was not over. Our guide, along with three other guides, who were all ex-miner, had kept some dynamite, detonator and a bag of ammonium nitrate.
The dynamite was rolled into a ball, the detonator pushed in and the dynamite put in the bag of ammonium nitrate.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/9361025/178337298.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
The dynamite...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338388.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
With Fuse...
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338382.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
With Ammonium Nitrate...
The fuses were lit and they ran off to a clear area and left the charges before running back.
<IMG SRC="http://pic4.picturetrail.com/VOL784/4062504/12177830/178338376.jpg" border="0" alt="Image Hosting by PictureTrail.com">
And burning...
We have a video of the results and if we find a way to post it we'll add it in!
After the final piece of excitement we were shipped back into town the protective gear handed back and we headed off for some lunch and a well earned beer before retiring for the day...
John
