Blogs from Rurrenabaque, Beni Department, Bolivia, South America - page 6

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Wednesday 11th May - Thursday 19th May The view out of the bus window of La Paz waking up to sunrise, a soft orange and pink lighting up the mountainside of houses and shacks, as we arrived at 7am certainly helped us to forget the night we’d just endured. Let’s just say I would rather sit on a vibrating power plate at the gym for eleven hours than take the same journey again. Easily the worst bus ride of our travels so far – to the point where we were looking at each other and saying ‘this can’t actually be for real and laughing hysterically whilst we attempted to land a finger on the ipod buttons! We made it to our hostel easily and enjoyed a well deserved shower for the first time in three days, ... read more
La Paz, Bolivia
La Paz, Bolivia
Rurrenabaque, Bolivia


Zurueck in La Paz und sogleich weiter nach Sorata, 3 Stunden von La Paz entfernt am Fusse des Illampu (6400m). Nach dem Fun-Erlebnis auf der Deathroad habe ich eine 5-taegige Tour von Sorata in den Cordilleras de Yungas nach Rurrenabaque im Dschungel gebucht. 2 Taege Downhill und drei Taege auf dem Boot. Nach 2 stuendiger Jeepfahrt kamen wir auf dem hoechsten Punkt, 4800m, der Downhill-Strecke an. Wir hatten wirklich gute Downhill-Bikes, die jeden Stein schluckten und somit die Abfahrt richtig Spass machte. Zu Mittag assen wir in einem kleinen Dorf auf der Strecke. Leider ging es nach dem Mittagessen nicht mehr nur bergab, sondern auch bergauf, was mit einem Downhill-Bike eher muehsam ist! Die Vegetation veraenderte sich schnell, vom kargen Antiplano hinunter in waermeres Klima mit Baeumen und vielen Baechen und Fluessen. Am Ende des Tages ... read more
Goldschuerfer
Aligator
Sonnenuntergang


Our flight left early from the military airport in La Paz for a town in the Amazon Basin. It was a fairly small (but not as rustic as I'd expected) propeller plane. We opted for the 40minute flight rather than 20 hour bus since we'd heard the journey was pretty rough. After the short flight it felt like we were in a different country. We went from the near freezing La Paz morning to tropical humidity in less than an hour. We found a nice hotel with hammocks and the like and then spent the day looking for a tour into the jungle for the next day. We went for a company which I'd already heard about and we decided on 3 nights 4 days in the jungle. The other option was a pampas tour which ... read more
View from the Mirador
Some 'Walking Trees'
Jaguar footprints by the river


Ok so with Danny now recovered from altitude sickness, we headed 6 hrs north/east to Potosi. We got a bus costing 3 quid each and I now understand what my Mum means when she says you pay for what you get......the bus journey was horrific. Bolivia is basically 1 big mountain range and the roads are terrible – we saw 1 truck that had slid off the road so instead of taking that turn easy our bus driver overtook at speed on a blind corner......oh and did I mention this was all happening with snow so you could hardly see.....................we survived and made it to the world’s highest city at 4020m above sea level. By this point a gang of us had formed (i.e. the 6 guys and gals from our salt plain trip and a ... read more
Photo 32
Photo 33
Photo 34


I took an internal flight from La Paz to the little town of Rurrenabaque on the edge of the jungle. The distance was only actually about 150km yet it takes 24 hours to travel between them by road - you can imagine how bad the roads must be! I therefore decided that flying was definitely the best option. Rurrenabaque is right on the edge of the Madidi national park which is a huge area of rainforest. I had arranged with a local company to do a 3-day trek in the jungle. Unfortunately, there are a lot of rubbish companies who offer treks and boat trips into the jungle who do a lot of damage to the area by feeding the animals etc so I was sure to pick one of the "ecotourism" ones that don't do ... read more
Base camp
Boating down the river
Deep in the jungle


Wow! I have just returned from THE most amazing 3 days! I decided that even though I wasn´t 100% better I would head to Rurrenabaque and go to the jungle as I had been so looking forward to it! So I flew back to La Paz stayed a night and then got a 8am flight the next morning. It was freezing in La Paz so I was dressed for the wintery conditions knowing that as soon as I landed I would have to shed all my clothes as it would be so tropical. The flight as 45 minutes and I met some lovely people at the airport and ended up sharing a room with a dutch girl. This was also beneficial as I didn´t have to trapse around all the tour companies and decide who to ... read more


I'm sitting here watching re reuns of Dawson's Creek, cringing at Dawson's well cringe worthy lines and laughing at how awkward Joey is. I'm supposed to be sitting here writing about my awesome three day trip into the Pampas just outside of Rurrenabaque so i'll try my best, but I cannot assure you that I won't be distracted by the uber cool Pacey, ohhhh or the chaos going on outside the window of my boxy little room in Sucre. Welcome to the Jungle. What an awesome three days spent in the jungle; well officially three days spent in the Pampas; a beautiful part of the Amazon; wet lands as pretty as a picture, as many species of birds as one could ever wish for, giant guinea pig looking things called insert name here, crocs, piranhas, mosquitos, ... read more
the dutchies boat
oh so tranquil
the wolf pack

South America » Bolivia » Beni Department » Rurrenabaque April 25th 2011

Escaping the Altiplano for a bit!... read more
Approaching jungle
On the Beni river
Isla del sol

South America » Bolivia » Beni Department » Rurrenabaque April 23rd 2011

Bolivia is definitely the biggest culture change, which we particularly noticed on our bus journey to La Paz for our flight to Rurrenabaque. We learnt the coaches do not have toilets and rest stops didn't either. Poor Jane was stared at as she tried to couch behind a wall, clearly we're an attraction. Although there was a 5 hour bus delay due to barricades we made it to La Paz the next day for our flight. The plane was a little 18 seater, you could see the two pilots (I'm sure I learnt how to fly one now!) and it was too small to stand in. It was an experience as we flew alongside mountain tops and landed on a strip surrounded by the jungle.     We were unable to get onto a jungle tour straight ... read more

South America » Bolivia » Beni Department » Rurrenabaque April 16th 2011

Just before embarking on our amazon journey we received news that mum had completed her last chemo and had been given the all clear. With this wonderful news and so happy her struggle was finally over with, we were at last able to relax a little bit on our travels and more importantly have an amazing 2 week cruise to look forward to in June!! We had a big drink for you mum (don't worry about that)!! Here's to family and good health. We took a very nail biting taxi journey to the airport where Perdy was nearly crushed 4 times between the central reservation and a bus. But somehow, we made it without a scratch on us. Just when we thought that things couldn’t possibly get any worse and all our horror travel stories were ... read more
Tin can Plane
View from the plane
Tiny cabin




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