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Up The Khallapa River Valley

Represa Hampaturi from the window of ruined building

Many of my favorite memories of my first time in Bolivia, 25 years ago, involve days spent hiking, fishing, and floating around on the lakes (lagunas) in the Andes above La Paz.  When I returned to Bolivia, two of the questions in the back of my mind were, “Will they still be there?” and “Will they be the same?”  Although the answers (“sort of,” and “not really”) are not exactly what I might have preferred, the area containing the four lagoons (now all more or less reservoirs) above Represa Hampaturi, in the canyon above Irpavi, is still an interesting place to explore.  And, for better or worse (actually, for better and worse) they are now much more accessible than they were 25 years ago.  With the new roads, you can be at 15,000 feet in about an hour of driving from Irpavi, and I promise you can completely forget La Paz.  What’s more, these are great places to visit when the blockades are in place, as no one would ever blockade these roads.

The Khallapa river valley extends up above Irpavi, in the Zona Sur of La Paz.  “Khallapa” in Aymara probably refers to the beams used to shore up a mine, and the name may be connected to the small-scale mining in the valley.

Since getting to Bolivia I have made it up to five lakes above Hampaturi.  There are also several more, including  Jachcha Khasiri, up the canyon of the Palcoma River which winds up towards the Serranias Murillo just below Hampaturi.  Although the nature of the lower lakes has been significantly changed by their conversion from natural lakes to reservoirs, the dams in the upper lakes tend to be less intrusive and the lakes retain more of their original character.  In any case, all of them lie in spectacular high-mountain settings, several of them surrounded by bofedales and snowy peaks, with llamas roaming across the terrain.  Sparkling brooks connect them and there are several spectacular waterfalls (and probably several more I haven’t chanced upon).

By the way, there seems to be no effective English translation for the Spanish term “bofedal,” probably because there are few “bofedales” in English-speaking countries.  The term refers to a high-altitude wetland at above 3,800 meters (12,500 feet) of altitude.  It is it’s own special (and usually tiny) ecosystem, involving different forms of mosses and other plants adapted to the altitude, the cold, and the humidity.  As an aside, Wikipedia, the source of all truth, has this to say about bofedales: “los bofedales mas grandes se encuentran en la antartida , alberfando gran cantidad de elefantes y tigres de bengala” (the largest bofedales are in Antarctica, where they harbor large numbers of elephants and Bengal tigers) (http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bofedal).  If it wasn’t Wikipedia, I might wonder about the accuracy of this statement. (Update:  apparently some vandal has since deleted this important information from wikipedia.  Luckily we have it recorded here for posterity.)

Bolivian “bofedales” do not generally host either tigers or elephants

Getting There

Although this should be straightforward, since the lower part of the Irpavi Canyon is residential, there are actually a lot of twists and turns going up and a lot of turnoffs which could easily take you the wrong way.  You would probably still get there eventually by always taking the route that climbs the canyon, but it might take you a while and involve a lot of backtracking.  For that reason, my maps and gps directions might be of help.

From the MegaCenter in Irpavi, you head north until you reach the mental hospital.  Turn to the right just before the hospital parking lot onto a dirt road.  Although there are occasional cobbled sections, most of the road from here on out is dirt.  From Irpavi, follow the Rio Khallapa up past Kallapa Village and Estancia Lorokkota.  At Palcoma, some nine miles from MegaCenter, is the turnoff to the right which leads to Laguna Jachcha Khasiri. (Maybe from the Aymara “Jach’a,” or large?)

Another 2.5 miles up the road, lies the largest of the reservoirs in the canyon, Laguna Challa Pata, which may mean “sand in the heights.”  It is also known for the name of the dam, Represa Hampaturi.  This is a fairly large lake, and had trout in it 25 years ago (can’t say whether it still does).  It’s not the prettiest of the lakes, though, since the rising and dropping of the reservoir’s waters have left it with the “dead zone” around the waterline characteristic of reservoirs.  The road circles Challa Pata on the left.  You can see that potatoes are grown on the edge of the lake and there are a few herders’ huts.  There is also a ruined hut on the side of the hill to the left of the road which makes a nice little walk (and offers a stunning view).  Just past Challa Pata is an old mining camp, called Campamento Minero Solución.  Twenty-five years ago, it was an almost invisible ruin.  Presumably because of the increase in metal prices, it looks like it is again a going concern.  I’ll have to stop by there one of these days and ask what it is they are mining.  At about the same place is the Hampaturi Waterfall.

Aliciya at the Hampaturi Waterfall

I’ll put up descriptions of the drive on up the canyon to the lakes soon, as well as descriptions of the side trips into other canyons.

Mapping

Attached is a .gdb file with all the routes and waypoints.  You can find topographic maps (though somewhat outdated) covering the area at a 1:100,000 scale for free in the Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection of the University of Texas archive at Austin (http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/topo/bolivia/).  The relevant sheets are La Paz (South), La Paz (North) and Chulumani.  If you load these maps into OziExplorer (http://www.oziexplorer.com), you can also load the .gdb file (it has to be converted to .gpx first) which will plot the routes on the topo maps.  Pretty cool.

Comments

Pingback from Larry Memmott's Blog » Laguna Jachcha Khasiri (and beyond)
Time December 19, 2012 at 1:53 am

[…] the road described in Up The Khallapa River Valley.  Some 8.5 miles from the MegaCenter, take a right (south).  After crossing the Khallapa River on […]

Pingback from Larry Memmott's Blog » To Serkhe Kkota
Time January 21, 2013 at 1:47 am

[…] are two routes to Serkhe Kkota.  Both start Up The Khallapa River Valley, as described in that post.  I’m attaching a .gdb file you can use to view the routes on […]

Pingback from Larry Memmott's Blog » To Lagunas Aiuan Khota, Kunk Huikara, and Mikhaya
Time January 25, 2013 at 6:55 am

[…] trip starts where the drive Up The Khallapa River Valley ends.  Use the directions in that post to get to the starting point for this […]

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