Travel and Tourism in Bolivia

Incahuasi Island and the Giant Cacti

In the middle of the Salar, rising from the flat white like a mirage, is Incahuasi Island, also known as Fish Island or Isla del Pescado, a rocky outcrop that was once an island in the prehistoric lake and is now surrounded by salt instead of water. The island is covered with enormous cacti of the species Trichocereus atacamensis, which grow at an extraordinarily slow rate in this harsh environment, averaging about one centimeter of growth per year. The cacti on Incahuasi Island are estimated to be between 900 and 1,200 years old, many of them reaching 10 meters or more in height, their green columns rising against the white salt and the blue sky in a composition that feels more like art than nature.

Incahuasi is a mandatory stop on any Salar tour, offering not just the remarkable visual spectacle of ancient cacti on a salt island but also the only elevated viewpoint in an otherwise perfectly flat landscape. Walking up to the highest point of the island and looking out over the white expanse in every direction, with the volcanic peaks of the Bolivian Andes visible on the distant horizon, is an experience of scale and solitude that few places on earth can match.

Isla del Sol: The Island of the Sun

A short boat journey from Copacabana, Isla del Sol is the Island of the Sun, one of the most sacred places in all of Andean civilization. The Inca believed that this island in the middle of the world's highest navigable lake was the birthplace of Inti, the sun god, and of the first Inca, Manco Capac. The island has been a place of pilgrimage and religious significance since long before the Inca, and the ruins that cover its surface are among the finest and most atmospherically located archaeological sites in the Americas.

The island is about 14 kilometers long and 8 kilometers wide, rising steeply from the lake's surface to a central plateau, and then descending to the opposite shore. There are no motorized vehicles on Isla del Sol: transportation is on foot or by boat. The landscape is extraordinary, terraced hillsides dropping to crystalline blue water, ancient Inca walls rising from fields still cultivated by the island's small indigenous community, and at the northern end of the island, the most important ruins.

The sacred rock of the Inca, the Titi Khar'ka or Puma's Rock, sits at the northern tip of the island and was the specific point believed by the Inca to be where the sun rose from the underworld. The Chinkana, a labyrinthine complex of Inca ruins near the northern shore, is one of the most extensive and best-preserved archaeological complexes on the island. The ruins of Pilco Kayna on the southern end include an impressive Inca palace and a fountain of ceremonially significant spring water.

Spending at least one night on Isla del Sol, rather than visiting as a day trip, is strongly recommended. The island takes on a completely different quality after the day-trippers leave, the light changes, the lake becomes mirror-smooth in the evening, and the ruins become places of genuine atmosphere rather than tourist sights. The stargazing from the island on a clear night, above the light pollution of any city, at an altitude of nearly 4,000 meters with the lake reflecting the Milky Way, is exceptional.

Potosí: The City Built on Silver and Human Suffering

No city in the Americas carries a more ambivalent historical weight than Potosí. It is simultaneously one of the most important historical sites in the western hemisphere, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a place of extraordinary colonial architectural beauty, and a monument to one of the most sustained episodes of human suffering in American history. Understanding Potosí requires holding all of these things simultaneously.

The city sits at 4,090 meters above sea level in the shadow of Cerro Rico, the Rich Mountain, whose distinctive conical shape is visible from nearly everywhere in the city. The mountain is the reason the city exists. Its silver deposits, discovered in 1545, transformed Potosí almost overnight from a barren Altiplano site into the most important city in the western hemisphere. By 1611, Potosí had a population of approximately 160,000, making it larger than London, Paris, Seville, or Rome. The phrase vale un Potosí, meaning to be worth a Potosí, became current in the Spanish language during this period as a way of describing something of enormous value, and it remains in use today.

The silver of Potosí did not simply enrich Spain. It fundamentally reshaped the global economy. Spanish pieces of eight, minted from Potosí silver at the Casa de la Moneda, circulated as the world's dominant trade currency for two centuries. They were used in trade from the Americas to Europe to Asia, and they were the direct predecessors of the dollar. The phrase piece of eight, and the dollar sign that derives from the letters PS for pesos, both trace directly to the silver of Potosí. The historian William Prescott called Potosí the treasury of the world, and the claim is not excessive.

Sucre: The White City and Constitutional Capital

Sucre, Bolivia's constitutional capital and the seat of its Supreme Court, is one of the most beautiful cities in South America. Sitting in a temperate valley at 2,810 meters above sea level, significantly lower and warmer than La Paz or Potosí, Sucre enjoys a climate that its residents call perpetually spring-like. The city's historic center, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1991, is a remarkably well-preserved collection of whitewashed colonial buildings, baroque churches, shaded plazas, and cobblestone streets that together constitute one of the finest examples of Spanish colonial urban design in the Americas.

The city's name has changed several times over its history. Founded in 1538 by the Spanish, it was originally called La Plata, then Charcas, then Chuquisaca, before being renamed Sucre in 1840 in honor of Antonio José de Sucre, the Venezuelan general who won Bolivian independence and served briefly as the country's first president. The different names reflect the different layers of the city's history, which corresponds roughly to the different layers of Bolivian history itself.

The Casa de la Libertad, the House of Liberty, on Plaza 25 de Mayo, the central square, is where Bolivian independence was declared on August 6, 1825. The building is now a museum of national history, containing original documents from the independence period, portraits of the founding figures, and artifacts from the colonial and early independence eras. It is a place of genuine historical significance, the birthplace of a nation, and it is visited with corresponding reverence.

The Universidad Mayor Real y Pontificia de San Francisco Xavier de Chuquisaca, founded in 1624, is one of the oldest universities in the Americas. It has been continuously operating for four centuries and remains an important institution in Bolivian intellectual life. The university is deeply woven into the history of Sucre and of Bolivia, having produced many of the political and intellectual leaders who drove the independence movement and shaped the republic's early decades.

The Valle de la Luna and Other la Paz Attractions

The Valle de la Luna, Valley of the Moon, is a remarkable landscape of eroded clay formations about 10 kilometers south of central La Paz, reachable by taxi or as part of a guided tour. The erosion of the clay and siltstone formations by wind and rain has created a landscape of tall, narrow pinnacles, labyrinthine passages, and alien shapes that genuinely resemble the surface of another planet. The Moon Valley is not a vast attraction but it is a striking one, and the ease of access from La Paz makes it a worthwhile half-day excursion.

The food markets of La Paz are among the most authentic and compelling in any South American city. The Mercado Rodriguez, the Mercado Uruguay, and the numerous smaller markets scattered through the city's neighborhoods are where La Paz actually eats. These markets are organized by product type, with sections for fresh produce, cooked food, dried goods, meat, cheese, and spices. The cooked food sections are particularly remarkable, where cholita cooks prepare enormous pots of traditional soups, stews, and grilled meats that feed the city's working population every day. Sitting down at a market table and ordering a bowl of fricasé, a pork and hominy corn stew, or sopa de maní, peanut soup, alongside a working-class Paceña, is one of the finest ways to understand the daily life of the city.

Bolivia's Seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites

Bolivia has seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites, reflecting both the depth of its cultural heritage and the significance of its natural landscapes. Together, they provide a framework for understanding the country's extraordinary diversity.

The City of Potosí was designated a UNESCO Cultural World Heritage Site in 1987, recognized as an outstanding example of a colonial mining city that fundamentally shaped world history. The designation covers the historic city center, the Casa de la Moneda, the numerous colonial churches, and the mining infrastructure of Cerro Rico.

The Historic City of Sucre was designated in 1991 as an outstanding example of colonial Spanish urban architecture and planning. The city's well-preserved historic center, with its white-painted buildings, baroque churches, and colonial plazas, represents one of the finest surviving examples of colonial urban design in the Americas.

The Tiwanaku cultural site was designated in 2000, recognized as the physical remains of one of the most important pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas and a key link in understanding the development of Andean civilization from pre-Inca cultures through the Inca empire and into the present.

The Jesuit Missions of the Chiquitos were designated in 1990, recognized for the extraordinary synthesis of European and indigenous cultural traditions that produced the mission buildings and the musical culture of the Chiquitos region.

El Fuerte de Samaipata was designated in 1998, recognized for the extraordinary pre-Columbian carved rock and the associated archaeological remains of Inca occupation.

Noel Kempff Mercado National Park, located in the Santa Cruz department near the Brazilian border, is Bolivia's only natural UNESCO World Heritage Site, designated in 2000 for its extraordinary biodiversity, its importance for evolutionary science, and its pristine landscapes ranging from Amazonian forest to highland plateau.

The Qhapaq Ñan, or Andean Road System, inscribed in 2014 as a transnational UNESCO World Heritage Site shared with Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, represents perhaps the most ambitious infrastructure achievement of the pre-Columbian Americas. Stretching some thirty thousand kilometres across six countries, the network of roads, bridges, storehouses and ceremonial sites built by the Inca Empire connected the vast territories of Tawantinsuyu from Colombia to Argentina. Bolivia's component sections pass through some of the most dramatic Andean scenery, linking high-altitude communities and sacred sites that the Inca incorporated into their expanding empire during the fifteenth century.

Adventure Sports and Outdoor Activities

Beyond the Death Road mountain bike descent, Bolivia offers a remarkable range of outdoor and adventure activities for the active traveler.

Trekking in the Andes is one of Bolivia's great outdoor offerings. The Cordillera Real, the range of high peaks that runs northeast of La Paz and includes Illimani at 6,438 meters, Huayna Potosí at 6,088 meters, and a dozen other high peaks, offers exceptional mountaineering and trekking opportunities. Huayna Potosí is considered one of the most accessible 6,000-meter peaks in the world for climbers with moderate technical experience, and several operators in La Paz offer guided ascents that are popular with the adventure community. The two-day ascent of Huayna Potosí, spending a night at a high-altitude refuge at approximately 5,300 meters before the summit push, is one of the most accessible high-altitude mountaineering experiences available anywhere.

The Choro Trail, the Takesi Trail, and the Yunga Cruz Trail are three classic Andean treks that descend from the Altiplano into the Yungas cloud forest, passing through multiple climate zones and ecosystems in a few days of walking. These trails follow pre-Hispanic trading routes that connected the high Andean communities with the warm valleys below, and they pass through landscapes of extraordinary variety and beauty. The Takesi Trail, which begins near La Paz and descends to Yanacachi in the Yungas over two to three days, is generally considered the most accessible of the three.

Mountain biking has developed into one of Bolivia's most significant adventure tourism industries since the success of the Death Road tours, and operators now offer a range of routes beyond the famous descent. The Altiplano around La Paz, the valleys around Sucre, and the lowlands of the Beni department all offer excellent biking terrain.

The salt flats of the Salar de Uyuni are used for land speed record attempts and for various forms of vehicle-based adventure tourism. Watching the sunset over the Salar from a Land Cruiser parked in the middle of the flat, with nothing but white extending to every horizon and the sky turning orange and pink overhead, is an experience that requires no special physical ability and delivers one of the most spectacular natural light shows on earth.