12 hours to nowhere: turned aside at the Bolivian border

My favorite blog posts have been about places that brought forth feelings of wonder and amazement, be it Petra, Patagonia (and here) or the safari in the Ngorogoro Crater. This will not be one of those posts.

It was a very disconcerting 2 or 3 am, on a desolate border between Argentina and Bolivia. We had taken a night bus from Salta, Arg and were slated to arrive early in the morning in Tarija, Boliva. Night buses are great in some ways, but being conscience in the middle of the night with the artificial light and the cold often feels a bit of an out of body experience and this night is no exception.

We pile off the bus with everyone else at the Bolivia border and wait our turn with Migration. Once we get out our passports, the officer leafs through our well worn and heavily used passports. By now, there are over a dozen visas and innumerable entry and exit stamps. After going through the passport, he says the phrase that causes my heart to drop to the pit of my stomach - "Donde esta tu visa?"

Ummm, what visa? When I came to Bolivia 8 years ago, US citizens did not need a visa. I do recall some shenanigans from the Bolivian border officials when leaving the country, but they were just looking for a little bribe to grant the exit stamp, a bribe my buddy and I did not pay. This time, things are quite different, as the official comes around his desks and points to a shabby, but official looking, 2013 memo on the shack's wall that outlines the visa requirements for US citizens. Visa requirements that we can't quite meet between the $135 dollars cash per person, the xerox of our yellow fever certification, a hotel reservation within Bolivia and a copy of a bank statement.

This is not going to end well for us, I know immediately.

By way of background, many countries in South America have taken to reciprocal visa requirements for US citizens in response to the requirements made for their citizens visiting the US. It is hard to argue with such reciprocity, and I in fact think it is an admirable, and fair, policy response to the barriers imposed on people visiting the US. The countries, such as Argentina, Paraguay, Brasil and Bolivia mirror the requirements their citizens face for a US visa, such as demonstrating solvency, having a return ticket and a fee that is in excess of $130 dollars. Still, in the balance it is much better to be a US citizen, as in our experience the South American visas are proffered once we have met the requirements, as opposed to the challenge of getting a visa for people coming to visit our country.

Still, this policy dynamic means that we have paid 320 dollars a piece thus far for visas/reciprocity fees and explicitly stayed out of Brasil to avoid another hefty tab. We have to do some leg work to see whether it will cost us to enter Peru, Ecuador or Colombia.

Back to the middle of night on the Bolivia border, where we are screwed. Mu tries valiantly to talk our way into Bolivia, but to no avail. As a result, the bus continued onward and we remained on the side of the road in no man's land, left to our own devices, at 3 am on a very cold night. We trudge across the bridge spanning the gorge that serves as the border and back to Argentinian immigration and customs. At customs, we explain our plight and have our bags x-rayed. The customs official is very nice and actually helps us arrange a taxi to take us to the nearest bus station back to Salta.

He even exchanges some dollars with me so we have some pesos to pay our fare. Interestingly, the rate he offers is better than the official rate of 5.2 pesos to the dollar. Not as good as we have been getting on the black/blue market throughout the country, but considering the circumstances it is pretty remarkable. All the power in this exchange rests squarely in his control, after all.

With our tail between our exhausted and semi-delirious legs, the 50 km taxi ride back to a viable town goes quickly enough and only costs about 12 bucks. By the time we step out of that taxi it is about 4:15 in the morning and we are both quite bummed and zonked. To retrace our steps back to Salta requires another 5 hour bus ride or a 3 hour combi taxi ride. We opt for the latter because we can pay in the only currency that we have -- dollars. We just have to wait for the taxi to fill up, a process that takes another couple of hours that we spend dozing in the back seat of the car.

Finally, the car is full and we hit the road back to Salta, arriving at 10 am. Mu and I doze fitfully, resting our heads against each other and just wanting to be done with the ordeal. Total costs for the fruitless trip to the border comes in around $155 dollars. Just to get back to where we left 12 hours ago. Sweet.

Sometimes travel is life altering, and powerful beyond words. Other times it is depressing. We also learned a valuable lesson on assessing the visa situations of where we are going prior to getting to the border, so we don't get stranded once again. This time we got out of it fine, a bit poorer but nothing traumatic, but we don't want to get into this spot again. Because, frankly it sucked.

 

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