Bolivia, La Paz

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it's mostly a peaceful city though I met some english blokes this morning who were abducted. They got in a taxi, these two fellas, in came some guys with knives, and took them somewhere with guys with guns. Handcuffed em. Took all their valuables, camera, mp3 player. Held a gun to their head and asked for the atm pin number. Then they held the guys there for 24 hours, getting all the money they could. They fed them tap water (horror!) and gave them hotchocolate once, I was given to understand. Also, and apple. Then they let them go and gave em back their passport and atm cards and some other stuff, although they kept some clothes and what not.

Now that's luck!

La Paz means, the peace. La pez means, the fish, I think.

Now I'm in bolivia. Quickly what I did here--well I met these 4 american guys on the way over. Man were they a blast. They were headed the same direction, so we went together to the island of the sun. It was neat...Cool to hang with some americans for a bit. Helps with the homesickness, and it was kinda comfortable.

We joked around a lot, and last night, I got the best laugh I'd had in a long time. A few of em! Daniel took my guitar, and I told him to tell me bout the time he was in the lions den. He started off, ¨well, there's a man, named jesus, and he loves you. Jesus was sent here to save us all. When I was in that lion's den...¨ But it was way better than that, I can do it no justice. I laughed till I cried! What a story. They lowered him into that dark den, he said, he saw green eyes circlin him, and he soiled his pants...

Anyway, we just hung out, talked a lot of junk, it was fun. We went to this hostel and I had the realization that the hostel scene bores me quite a bit. There are many things I don't like about it, but i think mostly I'm very tired of it after 8 months travel. It's kinda like a college party. Anymore, I don't want so much to meet other travellers and hear their stories. At first, in europe, I loved the stories of travel, but now I've heard em all!

I just met up with my good buddy peter, from england. He's doing a mad trip as well in South America, and happened to be in La Paz. It's good to see him, he's like an old friend. We've caused some trouble together and we're bound to cause some more.

Isla del sol was neat. I was pretty much takin it easy and still recovering. I needed a week from where my parents left, and I was right, after that I started feelin better. Peter was sick a week too after the inca trail. My parents also were sick after...well, small price to pay, eh?

so here's the grand plan--
I'm going to the biggest salt flats in the world, then to this crazy mining town. THey are both going to be amazing experiences, I can tell you now, so I won't have to tell you bout them later!
Then I'm going to paraguay, then rio de janero, where I will stop all this travelling around. I've really been looking forward to that, to settling down, and I guess to be there in about a month. Whew, finally to relax, and not have anywhere to go, just music to make. I'm really anxious, it's like christmas when I was a kid. You just can't wait for it to come, and in anticipating it so much the minutes drag by. I've thus not been living well in the present.

Other than that, my only big destinations are the waterfalls at foz du iguazu.

So that's that. Now a quick blog about ecuador.

Paz!

Colin

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Photos

dude why´s there a rainbow around your head?
don´t worry, that´s normal...