HISTORIC TRIUMFO, BARRILES ART
Leaving El Moro Hotel, we drove a boulevard adjacent to the bay. There is a Spanish name for this promenade of art work and I’ve forgotten it.
A quiet resort can just pop up overnight in this vacation paradise.
The statuary every block is what you might expect close to the water.
A seabird, dolphins, and so on.
Michal spotted stanchions. “Oh, this place will be a mad house tomorrow. They are having some big art event.” I laughed because I am an art lover and Michal is not and will avoid such events.
La Paz has a Baleen Museum. A full whale skeleton sits outside the building.
La Paz has some beautiful old buildings. Michal wanted to find a Pier I store to look at furnishings for her new condo. But, those who gave directions were not clear enough for us to follow.
This church looked open but we didn’t tarry. She isn’t close to furnishing her place anyway, so we moved onward toward Triumfo
Even Michal was shocked to see tourism has come to Triumfo. This beautiful brand new bar with a gorgeous courtyard, newly opened, beckoned. It was too early to drink. But we looked around.
There wasn’t a customer in sight.
The courtyard has a statue of a man and his donkey pulling an arastas that ground the copper ore out of the rock.
The remains of a copper smelting tower is visible through the bushes. It has been closed for many years.
Next to the bar, we saw a For Sale sign with an open house, “Private Residence.” The courtyard was beautiful with many flowers and rock terraces.
The house still had some of the original furniture, or the type of furniture used in its hey day. The owner was a wonderful man who lives in La Paz and is the great, great, grandson of the mine owner. It is his house that is now for sale.
It is a sweet little house.
It has layers of history and kept up with the times.
Within the last five years, a modern bathroom replaced the old outdoor privy.
Small but comfortable.
The owner framed an authentic poster of revolutionary Pancho Villa recruiting gringos.
As we left the building to see his “guest house” and the well he told us still brings fresh water to the house, Michal pointed out the No Photographs sign. I didn’t see it. He just laughed and said, ” It’s okay. I know you have no ulterior motive.”
All around the well are rusted tools and artifacts from the mines. We looked deep into the well. It showed water about 15 feet down. He said the water is about six meters deep. A metal bucket is still attached to the winch, but he has installed a pump and the old oaken bucket is long gone. What an interesting neat place.
He shared with us a copy of an early Harper’s Magazine that mentions the mine and his great, great, grandfather. If your interested, this unique place is for sale.
His guest house was just as interesting as the house.
Some of the original adobe that covered the bricks to reveal what it was like before he restored the building now decorate the wall. He and his wife are Italian.
Some of the roads in town are paved, or cobbled.
The original entrance to town shows a packed sand road with a line of old palm trees.
A sand road in front of a modern little school building.
The older houses are small. Palm roofs do not leak but it takes an old time expert to do them correctly. The hot sun prevents them from decay and they last for many years.
We have no idea what the mural is conveying, but it is quite interesting. A cow, an ore car, a pick and shovel an Indian and this interesting face of a leader, perhaps. No town brochure tells the story.
Some streets are unoccupied and only rubble remains of the hand-made brick buildings.
Everywhere we drove could be heard the chirping of wild birds among beautiful flowers. Triumfo once housed 3000 people.
We continued our drive through the mountains South toward Barriles and suddenly my program refuses to load pictures. I’ll have to get help and finish this post later.
