Cotagaita is a small town in
Bolivia
Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...
. In 2009, it had an estimated population of 1904.
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Cotagaita (also: ''Santiago de Cotagaita'') is a country town in the Potosí Department in Bolivia
Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...
. The village was founded in 1570.
Location
Cotagaita is central to the municipality of Cotagaita and the capital of the province of Nor Chichas. Cotagaita lies at an altitude of 2640 meters on the Río Cotagaita, an inflow of the Rio Pilcomayo.
Geography
Cotagaita is located in the southern part of the barren plateau of the Bolivian Altiplano
The Altiplano (Spanish language, Spanish for "high plain"), Collao (Quechuan languages, Quechua and Aymara language, Aymara: Qullaw, meaning "place of the Qulla people, Qulla") or Andean Plateau, in west-central South America, is the most extens ...
. The climate is cool and dry due to the inland location and is characterized by a typical daytime climate, in which the temperature fluctuations between day and night are usually significantly larger than the seasonal fluctuations.
Climate
Transportation
Cotagaita is 240 kilometers south of Potosí
Potosí, known as Villa Imperial de Potosí in the colonial period, is the capital city and a municipality of the Potosí Department, Department of Potosí in Bolivia. It is one of the list of highest cities in the world, highest cities in the wo ...
, the capital of the Potosí Department
Potosí (; Southern Quechua, Quechua: ''P'utuqsi''; Aymara language, Aymara: ''Putusi'') is a Departments of Bolivia, department in southwestern Bolivia. Its area is 118,218 km2 and its population is 856,419 (2024 census). The capital is the ...
.
From Potosí, the road Route 1, which leads from Lake Titicaca
Lake Titicaca (; ; ) is a large freshwater lake in the Andes mountains on the border of Bolivia and Peru. It is often called the highest navigable lake in the world. Titicaca is the largest lake in South America, both in terms of the volume of ...
in a southeasterly direction to the Argentine border, leads over 37 kilometers to Cuchu Ingenio . From there, Route 7 branches off to the south and reaches Vitoti and Tumusla after 203 kilometers to Cotagaita.Tupiza
Tupiza is a city in Potosí Department, Bolivia. It is located at an elevation of about 2850 m. The population is 25,709 (2012 estimate). Tupiza and its environs are characterized by dramatic red escarpments which jut ruggedly skyward from the coa ...
is about 83 kilometers further south . There are no paved traffic routes in the east-west direction.
Population
The population of the village has increased by almost half in the past two decades:
The population of the region is mostly made up of the Quechua
Quechua may refer to:
*Quechua people, several Indigenous ethnic groups in South America, especially in Peru
*Quechuan languages, an Indigenous South American language family spoken primarily in the Andes, derived from a common ancestral language ...
people, 96.1 percent of the inhabitants in the municipality of Cotagaita speak the Quechua language.
Natural disasters
On February 6, 2020, heavy rainfall in the region resulted in catastrophic flooding
A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are of significant concern in agriculture, civi ...
from the river of the same name. Several hundred houses were destroyed and around a third of the population was affected.
References
{{Authority control
Populated places in Potosí Department