Advertisement
Published: April 20th 2009
Just a quick note - the pictures on the other blogs should now be fixed, crash photos are up! - have a look!
So we woke up in this hostel with the intention of heading to the hospital. Only it was 6 hours jeep drive away across rough terrain, not exactly what any of us were in the mood for doing. Oh and I forgot to mention, it was only me and Matt that had the bad injuries. Rosie, Paul and Lettie, in the middle row of seats, walked away with only minor cuts and bruises. I guess it was something to do with the fact there were three of them and they kind of got wedged together as the jeep was flipping over. Anyway, reluctantly and awkwardly the six of us squashed into another jeep (Colleen now also in tow to help as translator and general mother figure!).
We made it to the town early afternoon and were relieved to find the hospital was relatively modern and seemed clean and the like. Although I couldn't help but notice the dirty needles were kept in a 2litre Coke bottle! After an X-ray (£5) I was told, via Colleen, that
I would need a cast as I had fractured my index finger. Luckily, it was below the knuckle rather than across it and I wouldn't need to have surgery to put a metal pin in place. Told you we were lucky!
The doctor said yes, he could do the cast for me in the hospital on the same day. All I had to do was go to the local pharmacy and buy everything I would need to make it! Apparently thats how it works in Bolivia! So off we went, Matt having to buy a new syringe and cleaning fluid for what they'd done to his knee and me bandages and stuff. It really was bizzare. Cast fitted, off we headed for the hotel that we'd booked ourselves into for a bit of pampering (that means it had hot showers).
The next day we took things easy, did a bit of shopping and booked ourselves a Salt Flats tour that was only one day and got us out on the flats in a short jeep ride. I also bought a Bolivian hoody made from Llama wool that even had pictures of Llamas on it. I wore it all
the time, cost about 8 quid and its brilliant haha.
We also met up with Nils and the two Norwegian girls who had been in Colleen's car and all went out for a drink, apart from me who was told that, as I was still concussed, wasn't allowed to drink. It was fair comment really, in the hospital I'd been asked the date (it was something like the 9th of March) and I'd said the 3rd of February - I had no idea! Later that night we said goodbye to Nils and the girls as they got a bus to La Paz, and decided that in a change of plans we might as well head there the following day.
The tour the next day was brilliant fun. First stop was a 'train cemetry' - just a load of rusty old trains really but fun messing about on them. Then we went to the Salt Flats, via a 'Salt Hotel' which was frankly very bizzare. At the flats we had a lunch of Llama meat (brilliant!) and then were given loads of time to take silly photos. Enjoy. My favourite is us all emerging from the Pringles tube as
the various stages of man. It was great to finally make it there!
Later that night, we said goodbye to Rosie, Lettie and Colleen and went to get the night bus to La Paz. What else could Bolivia possibly have in store for us?!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.084s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 6; qc: 46; dbt: 0.0406s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
