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Published: February 8th 2006
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La Paz in a bowl as seen from the planeTo avoid a 3 day journey by bus to Santa Cruz we decided to fly there from La Paz. Whilst waiting for our flight we entertained ourselves by using the free American Airlines phone to book our return flight to the UK. Our ticket type dictates that we must fly home via Dallas, which was proving difficult at the beginning of June (visions of a cowboy convention in Earls Court????umm). Anyway after lots of being put on hold we finally got a date of return being 11th June.
Our flight turned out to be quite remarkable as La Paz has the highest airport in the world and the planes need 5k of runway to lift off, as well as requiring special tires to withstand the increased velocity. Despite this, we had the smoothest take-off we could both recall having and our fear of travelling with the local Bolivian airline soon dissipated. The view was also spectacular! Although we knew that La Paz was in a bowl in the earth it seemed almost surreal viewing it from above.
When we got off the plane in Santa Cruz we were hit with 32 degrees heat (it was 9pm!) which was a
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The toucan at reception in our hostel shock coming from the warm but rainy weather in La Paz/Copa. Not knowing an awful lot about Santa Cruz we were also gob-smacked by the ´look´of the city which seemed like a US town as opposed to anything found in Bolivia There were fewer people begging in the streets, everyone seemed very well dressed and we saw digital cameras and music equipment. This was unbelievable when you consider that in much of the rest of the country there is no running water and electricity. There is a massive divide between the Santa Cruz area and the rest of Bolivia.
We checked into a hostel in the centre of the city. The mattress was like a curled tongue so I had little sleep and was knackered the next day! (We soon changed rooms!) On the positive side the hostel has two charming toucans who run around the central courtyard - which was pretty cool. We spent a couple of days chilling out, looking around the city and catching up on essentials like washing etc, before taking a taxi to Samaipata.
Samaipata is a chilled out little town in the mountains which has a stunning pre-Inca ceremonial site called ´El
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El Fuerte Fuerte´. We decided to camp in a beautiful organic farm and guesthouse, which has great facilities including the best shower I have had in this continent! The next day we got a cab up to ´El Fuerte´and spent 2 hours exploring the ruins.
No one knows the exact purpose of ´El Fuerte´which has been dated at 1500BC. The main site, thought to be of religious significance is a 100m long stone slab with a variety of sculptured features: seats, tables, a conference circle and a number of designs such as scorpions and pumas. There are also the remains of over 500 dwellings and a strange hole in the ground (thought to be either a prison, communication system or water cistern). The area is still being excavated and more is uncovered all the time, though the excavation of the hole was apparently abandoned when the archeologists heard mysterious sounds emanating from the walls!
We walked back to the town from ´El Fuerte´which was a long but stunning walk as it is deep in the mountains. On the way back from the farm we found German-run bakery where we bought some natural yoghurt and home-made museli (a refreshing change from
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View from El Fuerte bland tasting fried food!!)
We stayed in Sampaipata another couple of days enjoying the scenary and relaxing before heading off the Santa Cruz. The camping was almost stress-free this time (apart from the attack of the mosquitos, Noel got 40 bites on his bottom in one evening alone!)
Back in Santa Cruz- we went to the train station to get some train tickets of the ´Death train´to Brazil that same day. The queue was VERY long and it took us 2 hours to get to the front. This is normal for Bolvia and you can only buy tickets the same day! When we did get to the front we discovered there were very few tickets left and none together... I certainly wasn´t looking forward to a 16 hour journey sitting away from Noel!
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El Fuerte
Wow, fascinating! The photo of the ruins at El Fuerte reminds me of some ruins I visited in the middle of Bali - very similar cubby holes carved into the rock - and they didn't know what it was all for either. Hope you've invested in some mozzie repellent, and that Noel's bitten botty is recovering!