My friend, Papi Tuomala, made a visit in the early 1980s, and the lift was not running. The reason? Unfortunately, the man with the keys to start the motor had stumbled over a precipice a few hours earlier and plummeted to an untimely death. Although the body was quite accessible, nobody had made any attempt to recover it or the sole set of keys to the ski lift. Having come all the way from Finland, and not wishing to be thwarted in his quest to ski the highest ski run in the world, Papi organised a group to retrieve the body (and the keys) so they could open the ski area themselves!

“The ancient rope tow, first installed in 1938, was likely inoperable thanks to a catalogue of ludicrous circumstances”

Some years later, I visited Chacaltaya, and although the lift operator had been replaced since the time of Papi’s visit, unfortunately the lift had not. It had broken down two weeks prior to our visit and remained unrepaired. The simple explanation was “Falta Plata!” (no money).