Potosi Region Travel Guide

The highest city in the world has a dark underbelly

Potosi, built at an altitude of 3976 metres, is the word’s highest city and a monument to Spanish colonial rule.

Its streets are lined with grandiose architecture reminiscent of the city’s heyday when Indian and imported Negro slaves mined enough silver out of a nearby mountain to prop up the entire Spanish economy for hundreds of years.

Potosi fell on hard times in the early 1980’s when the bottom dropped out of silver. However the mine is still operational and tourism has bolstered the local economy.