Plugs for Two New Businesses Catering to Tourists in Cochabamba

I have lived in Cochabamba for almost ten years now – through thick and thin – and it is a great place.

The people are wonderful. The weather is grand. The food (except for that lingering, unexplained lack of bagels and Thai food) is delicious. We've got one Jesus that cries human blood and another that is the tallest in the world (and illuminated in a lovely purple at night). We've got coca toothpaste and maracuya yogurt. We've got a 35 square block open-air market (la cancha) that makes Wal-Mart look like a 7-11 store.

Cochabamba, my friends, has it all. And now it also has two new businesses in town that speak to the rise in local tourism. With no financial reward or financial conflict of interest involved, I'd like to shamelessly offer up a plug for them both.


The Spitting Llama Bookstore and Outfitter
#615 Calle España

A young Bolivan/US couple, Rommy and Dave, just opened a sweet little store (on Calle Espana, a couple blocks north of Mayor Rocha) called "The Spitting Llama". It is as eclectic as it is small and definitely worth a visit. The store specializes in two things – books and travel gear – and has lots of both.

Bookwise, they have managed to put together just about every Lonely Planet Guide to Latin America ever written and also boast being the first bookstore to specialize in books written in Quechua. Their book collection includes 10 languages, though their English section is mostly the same bad airport novels most places have, with the exception of the one I bought on opening day, Danny Dinosaur Goes to Camp – "Riveting! Says the New York Times."

The Spitting Llama also has backpacks, hiking boots, flash drives, sorojchi pills, many maps of Bolivia, and just about everything else one can imagine that a tourist here might be looking for. As David wrote in his opening announcement, "a store so chaotically fabulous that most of you would probably steal from us." So do go visit them and tell them "Jim sent you". But do avoid actually stealing anything. I think they meant that as a joke.

Cochabamba by Double-Decker Bus
Plaza Colon

I truly did a double take this morning when I saw the red double-decker bus with the open rooftop parked alongside Plaza Colon. It was like the time years ago, when I was still living in San Francisco, that I saw a woman in full polera peering into the windows of the city's gay district (she turned out to be Lydia Cardenas, the wife of Bolivia's Vice President). I have been to London. I have seen red double-decker buses. I just never saw one before in Cochabamba!

As of Monday of this week you can now take a tour of Cochabamba (I am not making this up) in a bright red double-decker bus with no roof on top. Really. Cochabamba Turistica takes on passengers twice a day – at 10am and 3pm – at Plaza Colon. The two hour tour runs you by the city's main plazas and churches, past everywhere else one might want to classify as "tourist worthy" (I think that Dumbos ice cream is a stretch but, whatever) and of course up to the world's largest Jesus (which during the day only comes in white).

The whole thing costs 15Bs. I haven't been on the tour yet but, if they'll let us bring beer aboard, it might make for a creative way to have our next Democracy Center staff meeting.

All of this is a hopeful sign, I think, of increasing tourist interest in Bolivia and a chance to create some new small pockets of economic opportunity out of it. Of course, while neither of these businesses paid me to make this plug, I do have a self-interest that I feel compelled to confess. Where red double-decker buses and Danny the Dinosaur dare to tread, can garlic and onion bagels be far behind?