Laja – Tiahuanaco

In America, Bolivia 2001 On  11/07/2001  One comment

I left at 9am to a tour in Tiahuanaco. In the way we stopped in the small city called Laja to visit the Baroque Mestizo style church. This was created to commemorate the victory of the Spaniard on the Incas. On the left side, there are Inca symbols as the condor, while on the right there are catholic symbols. The visit the Tiahuanaco starts in the local museum that shows indigenous objects from the region. We learned a little about the pre-Colombian cultures and went for a walk in the ruins.

Tiahuanaco was perhaps the most important culture in Bolivia. It was divided in 5 phases, the first it is believed it appeared 10 centuries before Christ, while that fifth it finished around 1200 DC. After this time the Incas arrived in the region and they took care of the temples.  Popular legends say that Viracocha (the greatest God, creator of the world) lived there. In the ruins there are some monoliths that according to the popular myths, it was Viracocha who petrified the people as a form of punishment.

After walk over the whole archaeological site, we were tired and hungry, after all it was past 2pm. We had lunch and drove back to La Paz. Tour was very well explained by the guide, perhaps too much information for a short period of time. What I liked the most in Tiahuanaco was an enormous room full of masks (faces) on the walls. The image of this place it will be with me forever…