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Published: October 2nd 2007
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We haven´t been up to much since we left La Paz just cruising around Bolivia taking it easy. We headed towards Santa Cruz, with the purpose of going on a jungle trek, but it turns out that Sam has developed a phobia of the jungle, so after a bit of discussion (!) that was off the cards.
I did manage to persuade him to stop in at an animal refuge on the way that i´d read about called Inti Wara Yassi in Parque Machia - we were originally hoping to volunteer there but somehow we´ve managed to run of time...I know it sounds odd, don´t ask how! The animal refuge does fantastic work and usually functions with around 40 volunteers - we were lucky that we got chatting to a couple of them and they let us have a sneak preview with one of the pumas. The pumas are usually out walking for about 5-6 hours a day so you don´t normally get to see them, however the one we saw is pretty old and has really bad arthritis from the cramped conditions he was kept in at the zoo, so he can barely walk now. I still had to
Puma
An old man in Puma terms but still gorgeous take a step back though, when he walked past me as he has a tendency to take a swipe at the female volunteer´s legs..so he can still move when he wants too! It was brilliant to get so close to him, there are still pumas in the wild in this area but you never get to see them, which I suppose is a good thing for them.
The monkeys at the refuge are mostly allowed to roam around where they please with an exception of a few which are kept on really long leads for their own safety. It seems the majority of them have been previously kept as pets, so it´s fantastic that they are now released back into the wild with the security of the refuge to rely on. Their favourite trick is to snatch your camera and then release it from the nearest tree, I was forewarned so kept a tight hold on mine, although the capuchin monkey in the first picture still had a good go at wrestling it off me! They also have their little hands in all of your pockets, so you have to make sure you have nothing valuable in them...you don´t
Spider monkey
He came into the reception area after our lunch....needless to say he didn´t get it hence the disappointed look! want to come all this way only to be pick-pocketed by a monkey!
In Santa Cruz we did some more animal spotting but this time in the form of the ¨two toed sloth¨. They have been relocated from the main square out to the zoo area, although they are not in cages which is great so they often end up back where they started in town. After an hours or so of wandering around the square craning our necks up into the air we couldn´t spot one so we headed to the zoo. We did the same thing there & thought that they might have eluded us, until we were sent a message from above..in the form of a sloth poo landing right next to Sam´s feet - perfect aim! We saw two and they can move pretty quickly, contrary to their reputation - they are not the most attractive animal, looking sort of thread bare like a well worn carpet, not the best look, but it does have a cool name.
Our next stop from here was Sucre, which although is only 600kms away, still took 14 hours on a bus - this goes some way to
Jumped by a Capuchin!
he thought I was the perfect picnic table on which to eat his bananas show you just how bad the roads are! We´ve been trying to avoid night buses in Bolivia but we had to get one for this section, we only had to stop twice to change the tyres and apart from that it was fine..I just had to pretend I couldn´t see the smallish black insects running around everywhere that looked suspiciously like baby cockroaches!
Sucre is a beautiful town full of old colonial buildings and quite quiet apart from when there are protest marches or fiestas happening - which seems to be all the time! Everyday we were there something was happening and it´s not just small groups but of at least 1,000 people. I saw a march against drugs and all the school children were dressed up us cigarettes or pipes etc. There was a massive fiesta on the Saturday night which turned out to be a practice for the following weekend - fireworks were being set off everywhere and all the car alarms in the street were going crazy! Luckily we just missed the protests the week before against the judical government being moved to La Paz from Sucre..this one involved sticks of dynamite, I guess they are
Comfy seat
Another spider monkey sitting on one of the volunteer´s heads definitely not happy! We took a trip out to the Dinosaur Quarry, thought to be the largest single collection of dinosaur prints anywhere in the world. Even though we were 250m away from the prints they are still really clear - $8 million is being spent on further preserving them. They have a good visitor section with scale models of the dinosaurs whose footprints they have found at the site.
The highest city in the world is where we have been for the last couple of nights. Potosi sits at 4,080 metres and is infamous for it´s silver mines, we decided not to visit them as the workers are in appalling conditions and we felt that there are some things that you just don´t need to see. Instead we celebrated being in the highest city in the world with a few pints and also paying for it the next day with a suitably reputable hangover!
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hayley Walker
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jungle
Hello Just to let you know.... Lo and I got EATEN alive on the trek from Santa Cruz. We still have the scars from the tiny flies. Worse here then anywhere else.. I think you did the right thing. I think Lo will agree Love ya I am so excited for you about the next bit you will see. Cant wait to hear about it. Miss you x