Casa de la Moneda, Potosí

Potosí sits at over four thousand metres beneath Cerro Rico, the mountain whose silver funded the Spanish empire for two centuries and whose extraction cost an enormous number of Indigenous and enslaved African lives. The Casa de la Moneda, the royal mint, is the best place to understand what happened here: a fortress-like building of thick walls and courtyards, holding the enormous wooden laminating machines driven by mules, the presses, coin dies, colonial painting and a collection that traces the silver from mountain to global currency. Guided tours run at fixed times through the halls. The city around it retains a dense colonial centre of churches and merchant houses built on the same wealth.

What you actually see

• The wooden laminating machines - vast mule-driven rolling mills in the mint halls.
• The coin collection - the silver reales that circulated across the world.
• Colonial painting galleries - the Potosí school of religious painting.
• The colonial centre - churches and merchant houses built on the silver.

When to go

April to October for drier weather. Tours run at fixed times in Spanish and sometimes English, so arrive early to book a slot. The building is cold inside, as is the whole city.

Honest expectations

Potosí is over four thousand metres and the altitude is punishing; the city is one of the highest in the world and visitors regularly arrive from lower ground and feel awful. Tours are guided only, at set times, and often in Spanish. The tourist mine visits into Cerro Rico that many operators sell are a separate matter entirely: conditions inside are genuinely dangerous, the mountain remains a working and unstable mine, and the ethics of visiting are contested.

Nearby

Sucre is around three hours away; the Uyuni salt flat lies southwest.