Friday, April 27, 2007
After dreary Wednesday, yesterday was bright and clear. A good day to map a few more communities. After a half hour walk and 15 minute wait, I a caught a ride south in a pickup as far as Chiquisis - an hour of bumping along mountain roads. From Chiquisis, another hour on even steeper, bumpier road in another pickup to Tzamjuyub. The scenery changes along the way to a different kind of rough, raw terrain. The
scale seems larger, the valleys wider.
But the communities seem even more vulnerable. They are built into the steep slopes with little clearance between the houses, and the slopes above the houses are mostly deforested to plant corn. Landslide country.
The batteries in my GPS unit died along the line. Fortunately I had mapped the communities I'd intended by then.
It took three pickup rides to get back home - for one one of them, I was sharing the pickup with four goats. Just one more Peace Corps experience.
