Villa Tunari

This weekend we decided to visit the Chapare region of Cochabamba, it is about 3-4 hours away from Cochabamba, so we decided to leave at 9am Saturday morning, which meant it was obviously a great idea to go out to Pimienta the night before. I got home at almost 5am and after polishing off a banana sandwich in the hopes that it would ward off a hangover, I had what I would define as more of a nap than a sleep. For having had 3 hours sleep I was surprisingly feeling fine and a lot more awake than other people. We didn´t actually all get to the meeting point until after 10, that extra hour in bed would have been lovely! We then got onto the bus to Villa Tunari which we were told would be leaving in half an hour, so we boarded and an hour later we were still stuck in bloody Cochabamba. Apparently the buses don´t leave until they are full and his estimate of a half hour was hugely ambitious! We were greeted by a number of sellers for the next hour, including one women who told us "No hay manzanas in Chapare". Which was total rubbish, as most of the fruit in Cochabamba comes from the Chapare! She just wanted us to buy her apples!

We finally left around 11.30, at which point a salesman stood up on the bus and gave us a monologue about protein, how a vegetarian diet is lacking in it, among other things for the next hour or so, to try and sell us his Maca Powder, which I am told by Will was pretty disgusting. The bus took bloody ages to get to Chapare, it was not a fun trip due to being unable to open our window and being sat next to a cholita who took her shoes off for the majority of the journey. We kept stopping, and one time we were stopped for so long and it was quite close to Villa Tunari which meant it was incredibly stuffy and humid.In the end we all just wanted to get off the bus. This ambition was foiled by the driver who did not stop at Villa Tunari and went straight past it. Most of the Bolivians on the bus just turned round and were asking us if we were going to Tunari because we had just passed it! So after getting off the bus we had to a taxi back to the town.

We finally arrived in Chapare at around 5ish, the hope of getting there for lunch was ambitious, and none of us took any food for the journey! The first thing that hits you is the heat, it is very humid and this is during the winter! I would hate to feel it in the Summer. We walked around the town for a bit which was a lot bigger than I thought it would be, it was a pretty cute little town actually. There was a parade, which went on all weekend, to celebrate San Antonio, the towns patron saint.

We wandered round the town looking for a hostel that was recommended by the lonely planet and rough guide as the best budget option, and at 5 pounds each, it was very cheap. We had 4 rooms between us, I roomed with Amy. Our room was a bit of a dive, there was a dead cockroach that greeted us, no sheets on the beds, dead bugs everywhere, and the best of the lot, there was actually cat poo on the floor which Will stepped in and smeared all over the floor. He did clean it all up for us though bless him! It was pretty disgusting, she did bring us some sheets though. Alice, Annie and Catherine actually had a pretty nice room, and she brought them towels and toilet paper, which nobody else got, apparently we were not as popular with the owner!

We headed off to find a restaurant, and went again with the rough guides recommendation of the best restaurant in town, the san silvestre, this time it was a bit more accurate. We had a good meal, and I got some veggie food, some eggs, rice, fried yucca and salad, which was all pretty good but very filling! The restaurant was filled with animal skins and snakes in jars, so it wasn´t really my kind of place but at least we got some edible food. We headed back to the hostel and chilled in the "good" room for the rest of the night.

On Sunday we woke early, I actually risked a shower and it was not bad at all, it was cold but I was so disgustingly clammy that it was quite refreshing plus it was quite powerful. Me, Alice and Jamie walked into town to buy some breakfast for the group, we managed to find some bread, plaintains, mandarins, and some yoghurt and juice drinks which we took back and ate at the hostel. Then we set off to the monkey park Parque Machia.

The park is a rehabilitation center for injured animals. We got there quite early and headed straight for the monkey area. We got there and there was like 3 monkeys and they were all tied on leads to trees, totally confusing as to why they were in captivity, it was a bit shit and everyone was quite disappointed, but we headed off on the hike to the waterfall in the park. We went on a pretty good hike mostly uphill, along the way stopping at a nice viewpoint and then carrying on to the two waterfalls. Anything a Bolivian defines as a waterfall is just not, its literally just falling water, just a trickle! But it was pretty cool all the same. After the hike we decided to go back to the monkey area and thank god we did.

The second visit to the monkey section was so much better, there was absolutely loads of monkeys and they were all off leads, just roaming around, we could not have anything on us at all, as the monkeys wanted to steal everything. They were so cute, playing with each other, and jumping and climbing all over us. Jessica had the most up close and personal visit from a monkey, it climbed down her top and just stayed under her t-shirt, much to the amusement of everyone else. It was so cute there, I really did not want to leave the monkeys.

We headed into town and had some lunch, I had an absolutely cracking vegetarian omelette, was absolutely delicious. Then we headed off for our white water rafting. The company picked us up and drove to the place where we would raft too. I had no spare shoes so borrowed this amazing looking zip up boots, which were totally practical for rafting, not so for walking on rocks. The rafting was fantastic, it was category 2, so not amazingly difficult, but we were pretty awful none the less. He even made me switch sides with Katherine because I was so rubbish at it! We followed our guides commands on when to paddle forward, backwards, stop, and when to get down in the boat. It was so much fun. We stopped half way round and all jumped in off this really high cliff, I was pretty scared at the top but managed to do it in the end. The guide had to pull us back into the boat which ended with Amy rather hilariously being pulled right into the guides crotch! Highly amusing for the rest of us. We finished our rafting and headed back to the hostel to pack.

I was getting changed in the bathroom and saw something large move out the corner of my eye, I thought it was a moth but when I turned it leaped and I saw it was a frog, needless to say I screamed! I have no idea where it went or where it came from, but it scared the life out of me. We left the hostel and headed for the bus stop.

We were told that the last trufis leave at 8pm so getting there around 7.15 we thought we would be fine. How wrong we were! On arrival we were told all the drivers were too tired and no one was going back to Cochabamba until the morning. We were absolutely screwed, but thankfully this one guy offered to take us, if we paid a little bit extra, which we were more than willing to do. I was fully prepared to go back in a fruit truck, I just wanted to get back that evening. So we left around 8, and after around 3 hours, of which the driver was on the wrong side of the road for a large majority, we finally got home.

I really liked Villa Tunari, the climate is tough, it is so hot and sticky. However it was a really beautiful place. It is the beggining of the Bolivian Amazon basin, so it was pretty spectacular. I didn´t get bitten once, insect repellent must have been really good! Poor Amy got bitten a lot! It was a really peaceful and relaxing place, and it was an awesome weekend, we all had such a great time.

I have just found out that next Monday is a public holiday, so I am very tempted to do the Che trail this weekend, hopefully that will work out this time.