Subdued birthday celebrations!

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Bolivia as it turns out, was possibly the easiest border crossing of all. We were in the country where Che Guevara was savagely murdered by CIA backed agents, the country that now ironically has a President who´s motive is "movement towards socialism" which I am very happy about and the country that probably produces the highest quality cocaine in the world! I knew we were in for an interesting time in Bolivia, but it was a rather timid, but beautiful start. Copacabana, the Bolivian counterpart to Puno and much more attractive and also the reason for the famous namesake beach in Rio de Janeiro (ahhh, Rio, happy days!), is a small town, built entirely it seems on tourism and the starting point for tours to the Islands where the Sun and the Moon were born according to the Incas. During the day it was like an oven and at night it was like a freezer. There was a magnificent cathedral there, though it seemed incredibly oversized for the size of the town, but then again, Christianity is a pretty big craze here! I was saying in my last blog that we went to the floating islands, built of reeds. Our hostel owner told us that they would offer us to eat the reeds and that they would say they were full of nutrients. Apparently they are full of nutrients, they are also full of toxic waste that is absorbed by the reeds and he told us that we should not eat them under any circumstances, but Muzz being a bit hard decided to have a nibble. When we arrived in Puno he was taken to hospital with food poisoning and spent the next 42 hours with chronic diarrhea, a temperature, the shakes and a feeling of constant nausea. Apparently it was the pizza though, even though Louise, Ston and I also had the pizza and weere fine! Anyway I have to give it to him, he did come to the Isla del Sol and the Isla del Luna with us, but he was suffering the whole time. Isla Del Sol is well worth the visit, Isla de Luna is definately not! You could tell we were in the poorest country in South America, out boat here in Bolivia made our boat in Peru seem like the QE2, but we soldiered on and the Inca site we eventually arrived at was well worth the effort. An ellaborate labrnyth of passages and rooms with absolutley fantastic views over the ever beautiful, azzure, Lago Titicaca and we only wished we had longer to wander around, but Isla de Luna needed a visit. A short trip further on the boat and we arrived at officially the worst Inca ruin of all time, OFFICAL I say! It had not been cared for remotely, it was covered in scorch marks where people had had fires and the attempt at renovation on one side was shabby. If you read this before you go to Copacabana only do Isla del Sol and do the proper walk there, leave Isla de Luna to the moon! It was Louises birthday in Copacabana and Muzz, Ston and I were on hand to remind her that it was about time to resort to desperate options and find a nice Bolivian farmer to make babies with because time was running out! Unfortunately Muzz wasn´t well enough to go out and Tom and Marion obviously hadn´t taken into account that Monday nights in Copacabana was not the best time to be celebrating when Louise was being planned! It was completely dead and most places were shut, we did however have a cracking Mexican so we all walked away with a smile on our face. Copacabana is well worth the trip (save the Isla de Luna). It´s an attractive town and if you can only do Puno or Copacabana choose Copacabana every time. Next stop: LA PAZ!!!

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