111218: Walking with dinosaurs - Parque Cretacico,


So here we are in Sucre. Why Sucre?  Well, it has a climate that is pleasant all year round. It's the constitutional capital of Bolivia (as opposed to Santa Cruz which is the financial capital, and La Paz which is the de facto capital because that's where the government sits).  It's also a good place to begin the acclimatisation to altitude at 2,800 metres. We fancied a few restful days to break ourselves into holiday mode before heading up to the heady-heights of Potosi.

But why would anyone really come to Sucre?  And the answer is dinosaurs!  

We WhatsApped the owners of where we are staying asking for a recommendation for a driver to take us up to Cal Orck'o - the world's largest paleontological site which just happens to be on the outskirts of the city.  Cal Orck'o means limestone hill in the local language.

In 1948, Sucre was hit by a big earthquake.  In order to rebuild the city a cement quarry was established on a nearby hill in 1949.  During the 1980s, the quarrying exposed a huge cliff about 1.5 km long and 180 m high on which there were thousands of dinosaur footprints.  However it wasn't until 1998 that European palaeontologists confirmed what they were.

Carmelita drove us up to the cement works and said it would take about an hour to look round.


Entrance to the Parque Cretacico
 The entrance fee for "extraneros" was 30 Bolivianos - about £3.50.  Locals paid 10.  As we entered a guide approached us and explained there would be a short tour in English at 11.30, then a walk down to the footprints at 12 noon.  As we still have not organised a SIM card for our mobiles, the guide phoned Carmelita and explained we would be three hours, not one.

 We had a wander around the huge, multicoloured dinosaurs, complete with sound effects. The are full size replicas!

Dinobus


The views over to Sucre were amazing.


Then at noon we donned George Osborne-esque hard hats and headed down a steep and delapidated path to the face of the cliff.  We were amazed how close we could get, but dismayed that so many ignored the pleas of Juan-Carlos, our guide, not to touch the footprints.



The walk down....and up




It's still very much a working quarry





Our guide explained that the cliff we were looking at was once the side of a lake.  Sediments had covered and protected the footprints and tectonic shifts had driven the lakeside up vertically.  He explained that the herbivorous dinosaurs hung round in packs for safety (think wilderbeasts) whilst the T Rex hunted alone.


Juan Carlos explained the process of stratification via a simile with a pamphlet's pages and showed tectonic shift by pushing the booklet in half.  He also had some kiddies plastic dinosaurs!

The site is applying for UNSECO world heritage status, but has to find a way of protecting the weathering prints.  In 2 or 3 years time the quarrying immediately adjacent will stop too.

Back up the steep path reluctantly, seeing the prints was a lifetime experience.  The heart pounding, heavy breathing and midday sun was a miniscule amount to pay to see this amazing site/sight.



The cement plant





The cliff





 The model of the Argentinosaurus was huge.  It's bones were found in Patagonia quite recently. We could not help thinking of our great nephew, Jack, who would love this place as he is dinosaur obsessed.









Carmelita dropped us off early afternoon and couldn't believe that we had finished sight seeing for the day.  But being on holiday for us is also about having to do things that we normally do not have time for such as reading books and, in Kevin's case, working out how his new camera works.

His not-so-old camera gave up the ghost in Costa Rica and Joan thought she had bought him a similar replacement.  Not so.  This was a "bridge" camera and far more complex. Neither of us are techies and can get very impatient with new gadgets.  This afternoon Kevin sat down and managed to work out how to do photo burst for good action photos.

This was fortuitous.  As night fell around 7 pm we could see lightning in the hills surrounding Sucre.  After a bit of experimentation and patience he caught a few shots of the lightning.



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