Potosi and the Silver Mountain

So after our time in Sucre trying to learn some more Spanish, we were back on the road again. First, we headed to the gas station to fill up which in Bolivia can be an adventure in itself. Don't know if we mentioned this before, so I will go through it a bit. In Bolivia, there is a resident price and a foreigner price. The foreigner price is about 2.5 times the resident price. For foreigners, the gas attendant is supposed to take your passport number and do some paperwork. Most don't want to do this, so some will just give you the local price. Some will tell you they don't sell to foreigners. Others will start bartering with you right at the pump and then just pocket the difference. We found that having Roberta barter for the gas with the mostly male gas attendants was best. Other times they won't put it right into the tank, but will put it in a jerry can. You can repeat this 2-3 times to then have a full tank. Such a weird way of doing things, but this is Bolivia. In this case they weren't going to give us gas, so we got a guy off the street to get it in our jerry can and then we gave him a tip.

We headed to Potosi which is home to the most well known silver mine in South America. It was a nice drive gaining a bunch of elevation and winding through the mountains.



Upon entering the city, it was the same old Bolivian driving debacle with skinny colonial streets and everyone cutting each other off and honking. We found ourselves a hostel with parking inside off overlander and found a great little place for lunch. A four course meal that was $2.
That night there was a bunch of people parading in streets, dancing, and playing music. They had bells on there legs which jingled while they danced. They were practicing for an upcoming carnival which seem to be happening every other week.















The next morning we headed to the Casa de Moneda which is now a museum but served as a the mint from the 1700s to the 1950s. The original one was constructed in the 1540s. We walked around looking at how they have made the silver coins over time. First with a hammer press, then with a screw press, and then a steam press. You could definitely notice the quality increasing with time.






These large gears were driven by mules and they flattened out the silver sheets, before it was pressed into coins.







The next morning, we headed out on the tour that we had come here for: a tour in the mines of Cerro Rico.

When the Spanish arrived in the early 1500s, it didn't take them long to figure out that this mountain was full of silver as it was right on the surface. The natives of the area had always known it was full of minerals as well, but the mountain was sacred to them so they never took any of them. But then the Spainards made them into slaves and forced them to mine the silver.
It is said that you could build a bridge from South America to Spain with all the silver that was taken back to Spain from this mine. The silver was extracted from the rocks and processed in the mint. It was then carried by mule all the way up to the Caribbean coast and put on ships to head back to Spain. This was the reason the Caribbean became so full of pirates. It quickly became the richest city in South America.

It is also said that you could build a bridge from all the casualties that occurred in this mine. An estimated 8 million people have died in these mines! Quite a tragic story that still continues today. Although the workers are not slaves anymore, they still are using the same basic tools and have the same miserable working conditions there were 500 years ago. Nowadays most miners die from cave ins or "black lung" from inhaling the dust.

Before going to the mines, we stopped at the miners market. They sell all kinds of hand tools, clothes, and of course dynamite. Basically anyone can just walk in and for $4, buy themselves some dynamite with a fuse. Zero regulations. As a way of keeping miners cool with visitors in the mines, we bought them some drinks, coca leaves, and of course dynamite as presents.



We then made our way up the mountain towards the mines. We were informed that there are around 400 mines in the mountain with 180 that are still working today. Around 14000 people work in the mines today which has declined from the 25000 that did in the past. There are 37 mining cooperatives that the miners pay to be a part of that helps negotiate a price for the minerals which include silver and tin. The amount a miner makes in a month depends solely on how much minerals he extracts. Even though it's not a lot of money to us, they can make double the amount than they can at other jobs so they choose to do it.



Looking back at the city of Potosi.







As we came closer to the mine shaft, men were pushing out carts full of ore that had to have weighed a couple tons.










We made sure to stay out of their way. This continued as we made our way inside and our guide would show us where to go and sometimes tell us to run as there was no way to stop the carts. It was pretty real. As we made our way deeper into the mine, the walls and roof got smaller and smaller. We had to crawl and squeeze through some spots. Being at 4400 meters, it was also difficult to breathe especially when you were covering your mouth/nose for all the dust.















The way that they mine is they hammer holes in the rock by hand around a mineral vein, stuff the holes with dynamite, and explode the rocks.




They usually set off the dynamite at the end of the day as it creates so much dust. Then they carry the ore to the carts and cart it out of the mine. Where it is dumped and then wheel barrowed onto dump trucks. Hard, hard work.










It's crazy that they are still using pretty much the same ways of extracting the ore as they did 500 years ago. It is quite sad how bad the working conditions are and how there is still around 4 deaths a month from cave ins. In the western world, this place would have been shut down long ago. Should you ever be complaining about your job, just think about this and maybe you might realize things aren't so bad.

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