Blogs from La Paz, La Paz Department, Bolivia, South America - page 124

We made it to Bolivia! Yesterday we did the 5 hour trip from Arequipa to Puno, Perú. Puno is at about 12,500ft , and boy did we feel it. On the bus ride our ears were popping and our heads hurt a bit, but nothing too serious... we were too busy enjoying the beautiful sights of the countryside. The minute we stepped off the bus in Puno -wham- elevation hit us. Dizziness, confusion, severe headaches, nausea, exhaustion, tingling fingers, toes, and face... you get the idea. Apparently 12,500ft is pretty high! Mate de coca (coca leaf tea) is said to aleviate some of these symptoms, so we promptly had 2 cups each and took a nap. Yesterday was a little rough, but we are much better today. We got up early in Puno to catch the ... read more

Well our bus journey from Puno to La Paz was pleasant and really scenic. Other than the nerve racking experience at the borders, we had no problem. The drive took us all along Lake Titicaca which was beautiful! Unfortunately we had to head straight to the British Embassy first thing on the Friday morning, so stopping and spending a leisurely few days on the lake was out of the question. (Isla del Sol, a big destination for most was given a big skip.......maybe next time!!!) Our first view of La Paz was incredible. It is a huge city, nestled in the mountains and built right high up onto the surrounding mountains. Really amazing! We booked into this huge old, draftly hotel called Torino. It was cheap (kind of cheerful.....okay. Scrap that. Just cheap!!!) It was run ... read more

Surely with that great punning ability, a future career at the Sun is beckoning!!! My two weeks based in La Paz, Bolivia’s de facto capital, have come to an end, and while the city is certainly no architectural beauty, its location in the Andes' Cordillera Real (Royal Range), is pretty spectacular and in my mind makes La Paz pretty attractive. Set in a bowl or canyon at 3,600 metres, the city's housing and buildings stretch steeply up the walls of said canyon to the Altiplano 400 metres above. Handily this makes La Paz one of the easiest cities I have ever come across to navigate, as the main street, the Prado, runs along the bottom of the canyon floor, and so all you have to do the find it and orientate yourself is to walk downhill ... read more

27 Mayo - La Paz Okay, last day in La Paz. There are markets for different kinds of food, flowers, household stuff, basically anything you could ever want, you can buy on the street. There is an Api market here, where you can go buy the warm drink really cheaply and if you speak a little Spanish, you can be assured that you will be elbow-to-elbow with someone who would love to have a conversation with you. These are the coffee shops of Bolivia. There are all kinds of people stuffed into these little places getting Api and brunelas. Api is a thick purple drink comprised mostly of purple maize. It is seasoned with sugar, lime, cinnamon, and a little bit of cloves and served steaming hot. It is so thick that you don't realize how ... read more

26 Mayo - La Paz Nikki is feeling ill. Poor thing. She has not been well since Manu. She spent a couple of days sick there and now she is fighting something else. But she is a trooper, that's for sure. She doesn't wants to miss anything, so she toughs it out no matter how bad she feels. She reluctantly decided to go on the Caiman expedition with us in Manu, even though she felt like crap and should have just been resting, but we were assured that it would only be a couple of hours and that she would definitely want to see the Caiman. Then our boat never showed up so we ended up hiking all the way back to the lodge on some pretty rough river-rock terrain, and we never even saw the ... read more