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Published: July 21st 2009
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On return to Rurre from the Pampas we were all buzzing however it was time to start saying our goodbyes as Cinthya was heading out on a flight to La Paz that evening and Dave was following the next morning. The six of us booked ourselves into the same hostel and whilst doing this Cinthya rolled up telling us her flight had been canceled due to the weather so she had to stay the night. A shower was the first item on the list for Sharon and I and the second was a beer. After telling the rest of the guys where we would be we headed to the local bar and once again relaxed and relived the last three days. Eventually the whole group were together and we had a last night celebration with quite a few drinks, food and some pool thrown into the mix......
Sunday morning we all got up and Dave, Scott, Sharon, Aron and I all headed to one of the local bars and watched the Wimbledon mens final. After this it was another chilled afternoon in the hammocks. Goodbyes and good lucks were said to Dave that night.
Monday rolled around and Scott,
Aron and I decided we were going to go and do a jungle canopy tour so we booked ourselves onto the trip for that afternoon. Kate said her goodbyes as she headed across the river in order to go and do some volunteer work at a local animal sanctuary Scott was to follow the next day.
Monday afternoon the three of us headed to the tour offices from where we headed to the riverside and took a 20minute boat ride down the river. On getting off the boat we were told we had an hours walk through the jungle to the start of the zip wire. On our way through the jungle we were shown various animals and plants by our knowledgeable guide, Nelson. We saw a pendulum bird and its nest, a water spider, a tortoise beetle, an owl butterfly and various other butterfly's. We were also shown a praying mantis cocoon that had a lot of eggs in it. He also showed us a inconspicuous plant that turned out to be poisonous due to the spikes on the underside of the leaf. We also saw a walking tree so called because it can walk upto 1m per
year in order to find the sun in the jungle.
On arrival at the first zip wire platform we were given our saftety equipment and full health and safety instructions. All instructions were in Spanish and thankfully I understood the majority of what was said..... We then set off on our zip wire tour over the top of the jungle and once again this was an amazing experience and is pretty indescribable. We did 8 zip wires and on the longest one we were told you get upto a speed of 50mph!
That night as it was our last night we went for a meal at what had become our favourite restaurant. The final goodbyes between the last four of us were said..... Tuesday morning we were up bright and early for our flight however unfortunately due to a bit of cloud the plane was delayed and we therefore sat outside the airline offices for 3 hours. Check-in was at the airline offices in town and we then had to pay to get transported to the airport!!
We eventually landed back in La Paz where once again the altitude hit as did the cold. Rather than taking
a taxi back to our hostel Sharon and I decided to go the cheap way so jumped into one of the local minibus vans (they are a 10th of the price of a taxi). The minibus vans are mental you see them driving around La Paz and someone is always hanging out of the door shouting the cost and destination repeatedly however as a gringo you can never tell where they are going to. Thankfully this wasn't an issue for us as the airport was the first stop. Rucksacks thrown on to the roof and unsecured we set off and the van was soon full. Thankfully they stopped at the bus station for us and we only had a 10 minute walk to the hostel from there although it was a long 10 minutes as the altitude was once again hitting the breathing hard.
That afternoon we went in search of information as to the situation in Peru as we were aware that there were demonstration and the country was shutting down from the 7th to the 9th July and before going to Rurre the borders had only been open at weekends due to protests. At the present time
the country is in turmoil due to the government reclaiming indigenous land and also they have sold many of their utility services to American companies however the money is not being put back into the country. There have been many clashes between the government and Peruvians and for the past few months they keep holding protests and in doing so they block the roads with stones, glass and anything else that comes to hand to prevent the movement of people thus bringing the country to a halt. Anyway we were told that there was no clear confirmation that the roads would be cleared on Friday. Sharon and I decided to risk it and so bought our tickets to Copacabana on Lake Titicaca with the hope we could move onward on Friday.
Next stop Copacabana and Lake Titicaca one of the highest navigable lakes in the world....
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