Guarayos, Day 3 - Part 2 of the Che tour

A continuation from the entry on

¨Sun. 19 Nov. 2006 (this one`s a bit scattered)

¨The next day, on Friday, Hyojung, Sabina, and I started trekking to El Churo at 7am. Also known as Vado del Yeso (sp?), this is where Che and company were ambushed and captured (or killed). This trip was without the intense emotion I felt at the school and was instead really fascinating.

¨It took us about 1.5 hours to reach the gorge, the view on the way spectacular and the trail only slightly challenging. Sabina was telling us a few things about Che the day before - basically the same information we`d been getting from other people: the news on the radio, the helicopter landing in town, the soldiers passing through - and we discovered the reason she has these stories is from talking to the farmer who owned the land by the gorge. This farmer, who still owns and farms the land today, is the father of her husband. We met him there by the gorge, digging at a field of potatoes.

¨...Just above one particularly dark and rocky part of the gorge is a small potato field where the dense forest suddenly opens up...To one side was an old Bolivian with wrinkled skin and a worn-out cowboy hat.

¨He is quite the character - we spoke to him for a while about Che mostly, and about his life now. The guerrillas hid out at this place, behind the rocks that still stand there, and ate the potatoes from the field. I think Lorenzio (the farmer) had it rented to someone else at the time, someone who apparently reported to the police the guerrilla presence. There are bullet marks on one stone by the water, probably more elsewhere. The other stones in the field have things painted on them, one with ¨Che Vive,¨ another with some comment on Fidel Castro.

¨Anyway it was a rather pleasant visit. Oh, and made more interesting because Lorenzio darted into the bush for a few minutes and brought back with him a used bullet cartridge which came from one of the guerrillas´ guns during battle.

¨After the potato field and area, Sabina took us up a bit further to a small crude house where Che et al slep for a few nights, and afterward to another abandoned house where they asked an old woman for food.

¨At this point I started to feel quite sick - we started walking back a different route but I had terrible pains in my lower intestine area and lower back (for no particular reason - the food I had was fine and it`s not that time of month; this is just something I get once or twice a year). It got worse the further I walked so I lay down a fe times in agony until it subsided, only to have it get bad again after walking for another 10 minutes.

¨We made it to the house of Lorenzio at which I lay down on a bench and his wife made me manzanilla (like cammomile) tea. We stayed for lunch as well...I felt better when we left...¨

So on the same day on the walk back from El Churo, Jauma (Jaime is his Spanish name, Jauma is Catelan) happened to drive by in a taxi. He knew I was in the area cuz I`d written him earlier, asking for the email address of an ex-soldier who was involved in Che`s capture. It was a surprise to see him that`s for sure! A very good one though cuz I was getting rather irrited with Hyojung by that point so it was nice to have someone else there.

Anyway ¨Jauma has a foundation to do with kids and social problems in poor countries like India and Bolivia. He has a few people working in England and Spain, where he`s from. I`m not sure how well set-up or in what stage of organization his foundation is, but part of the work right now is to take photos of the children in poverty-stricken areas, collect their names and the names of their parents, and eventually load them onto his website. He asked me if, since I have a camera and he doesn`t, I would go with him back to Guarayos and Santa Maria to document the children. He pays for food and shelter and it shouldn`t take more than 6 days...

...

¨One thing I realize now after actually travelling with people - Hyojung and now Jauma - is that you can only travel with certain people, and if you have to travel with them you have to make compromises and get used to a different routine (something I`m not good at)... I don`t take well to being looked after - I like to preserve my independence while travelling and not owe anybody anything...

¨For now though I`m looking forward to Guarayos...Maybe I can visit Wayra if there`s time!¨

End of Che stuff, onto Guarayos itself!