Parque Cretacico

20 minutes by bus north of Sucre's central square, Parque Cretacico sits on top of Cal Orko, one of Sucre's surrounding steep hills, on the site of a still active limestone quarry and cement works. The bus we catch, affectionately known as the "dino bus", weaves its way past flat bed trucks and construction equipment,  Spanish dubbed version of the BBC's Walking With Dinosaurs playing on  TV hanging from the wall, and eventually leaves us at the park entrance in a small car park with spectacular views down into the valley. 

One of Sucre's main attractions, Parque Cretacico exists solely because of what the limestone quarry exposed in 1994. The quarry at that time was mining for soft stone, and when they hit a harder layer they stopped excavating and left a huge exposed cliff face open to the elements. It was only a couple of years later, after further erosion from wind and rain, that the exposed surface was finally scrubbed clean of the softer rock and the miners noticed footprints appearing. Cal Orko is now known globally as the largest single collection of dinosaur footprints anywhere in the world.

Hard hats on, a tour guide leads us down a winding set of stone stairs away from some of the most impressive life size model dinosaurs I have ever seen, and straight up to the cliff face. He explains, in both Spanish and English, that the cliff used to be the bottom of a shallow lake, muddy and still, and that the footprints of over 150 different species of dinosaur are recorded in its surface. We stand in front of sauropod tracks, circular plodding indentations, some almost 2m across, and track their progress along the rock face. You can tell which way the dinosaurs were walking from the way the mud, now stone, has been squashed behind each footfall. We stare up at theropod tracks striding away from us up the cliff into the sky, three toed carnivorous dinosaurs, middle toe leaving the longest and deepest impressions behind.

The guide tells us the basic facts about each dinosaur, 20m long, 8m high, carnivore or herbivore, and gives a brief explanation and demonstration of how the footprints came to be preserved which is decent enough from a geology standpoint. One girl asks, if I understand her mime correctly, how the dinosaurs had managed to walk vertically up the cliff face. The guide hastily explains that it used to be flat and only much later did it get tilted up by tectonic processes. He explains it well, but the girl doesn't look like she understands. 

"Flat." The guide simplifies. "Flat lake." 

I ask a few questions about the layers underneath and whether they have been scanned for more footprints and receive the answer that yes, in 2009 they used laser scanning equipment that revealed thousands more footprints buried beneath the surface. But any further information is denied to me as the tour has to move on along the quarry floor to the next set of footprints. "Sauropod, 25m long, herbivore".

On the way back up the hill Ellen and I hang back to take a few more pictures and appreciate the trackways without others standing in front of them. The guide is waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs. 

"I'm a geologist" I explain, "I find all of this really interesting"

"Oh how was my explanation?" Suddenly the guide is looking at me with an earnest and slightly worried expression, bobbing his head up and down. "Was it ok? I always want to learn more, was my demonstration ok?"

"Oh, er" I say a little taken aback, "yes your explanation was very good."

"How could I make it better? Can you tell me a little more detail so I can add it in to my tour?" 

"Er, yes, sure." I say far too quickly and then have to rapidly think through everything I have been told already in the last hour and everything else I learnt in those 1 or 2 lectures 7 or 8 years ago. I soon decide, in my head, that I really don't know anything extra of use to this man.

The guide waits expectantly.

"Erm. Well you could say something about the grain size? Of the mud? Maybe?"

Somewhere back in England my palaeontology tutor bangs her head on a desk. The guide merely blinks at me.

"The...grain...size?" He asks, clearly not understanding my English.

"Yes, the sand. Er mud. Limestone. It's very fine. Small grains." I am talking myself into a black hole here, and an irrelevant one at that.

"Ah." Says the guide. "Fine? What is fine?"

"Small" Ellen chimes in.

"Not coarse" I say very unhelpfully.

The guide looks very non-plussed so I pick up some sand and point to the large grains. "Big. No good. Coarse."I point to the small grains, "Fine. Small." I give the thumbs up.

"Ah. OK." says the guide. 

"Great" I say quickly. "Your explanation is very good." And with that I start off uphill again leaving the guide to follow behind me. When I get home, I promise myself I will re-read some of my notes.

"What did you study?" Says the guide.

"Geology." I reply. "Mostly volcanoes really."