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After spending another unproductive two nights in the Wild Rover in La Paz, Andrew and I finally boarded a light-aircraft to Rurrenabaque in the Amazon Basin. It was an incredible and slighly nervy 45 minute journey over spectacular mountains and into the jungle. We arrived in a completely different world - for the first time since Brazil I was in a hot and humid tropical climate. Oh, and the mosquitos were back... with a vengeance.
We quickly booked on a three day tour of the surrounding Pampas, a large wetland known for being the best place to view wildlife in Bolivia. That evening, while having a few drinks in the local 'Jungle Bar' I noticed our tour guide was spookily beckoning me over from the other side of the room. Using my, let's say, 'developing' Spanish skills I gathered that our tour had been postponed by one day due to a flight from La Paz having been cancelled that evening. No worries, we had a few more drinks and a later night than planned.
Next morning at 8.30am we were awoken at our hostel by our guide (he had a slightly alarming kanck of always knowing where we were).
He had found us a tour and we had 20 minutes to pack. Within half an hour we were sleepily bundled into a 4x4 with a tour agency we had never booked with and heading for the jungle for three nights - I imagined it was how being kidknapped by guerrillas would feel like.
We spent three hours travelling on muddy roads to get to our boat. This journey was made longer due to regular stops as we passed large buses that had got stuck in the road. Our driver was a fairly confident guy and seemed to take the mud in his stride and he took us through all of the roads with ease.
We then took a small boat through the Pampas to our jungle lodge, complete with two large Caimans who lived in the water below our beds. Over the next few days we went searching for Caimans at night, fished for piranhas before eating them for supper (bit bland, needed lime) and hunted for anacondas (we found a small one which I held, not nearly as scary as those depcited in the classic B-movie). On the last day we swam in the piranha/ alligator
/ caiman infested water with river dolphins, who apparently kept us safe from said nasties. This was an incredible experience, especially as the fairly weird looking creatures began to come up to you and nibble your toes.
After finishing our tour we were lucky enough to get on a flight the next day to La Paz. Exhausted from the ridiculous heat and covered in mosquito bites, we were ready to return to altitude. The flight back was in a much bigger plane than on the way there but still an interesting experience - La Paz has to be the only city in the world where you still feel like you're climbing even as you reach the runway.
We spent one more night in La Paz (we were starting to get a little sick of the city) before travelling with Dan, a guy who I first met in Mendoza and at various points since, to Copacabana on Lake Tititcaca, not to be confused with the much warmer Brazilian beach.
Copacabana is very touristy and a little bit dead in the evenings, but also very picturesque and peaceful. On the first day there we took a rowing boat out
on the water and on the second day we took the ferry over to the stunning Isla del Sol, centrepiece of the lake and famous for being an important Inca relgious site.
Isla del Sol is a stunning and captivating place, with incredible scenery, bright sunshine and very few people, all of which still live in a traditional indigenous way. We stayed in a small town which seemed to only contain children (our hostel was run by a nine year old) and which had only restaurant which served tasty river trout.
We walked across the island the next morning and then took a boat from the south back to the mainland, where we caught a bus over to Puno, Peru.
Puno was not the greatest place I've visited, to be perfectly honest. A slightly sketchy town on the edge of the lake, it had none of Copacabana or Isla del Sol's charm. The first night we went to a rock bar whcih the Lonely Planet described as the 'best bar in South Peru'. We soon realised that a) YMCA is a an acceptable song choice in a Peruvian rock bar and b) the Lonely Planet shoudl never
be used to plan a night out. We then made it to a local club which was an experience - you tend to stand out when you're a foot taller than anyone else in the club.
Our last day in Puno was spent visiting the floating islands - strange man-made islands where local tribes have lived for thousands of years. They are made from mud and reeds, and anchored to the lake bed to stop them, literally, floating away. The whole experience was a little bit over-touristy and at times slightly cringeworthy. However they were unique and well worth seeing. We then visited Taquile, another island which confirmed again that Lake Titicaca is one of the most beautiful spots in South America.
Last night we took a night bus to Cusco, the one place everyone visits in South America and apparently a little bit of a highlight. So far we have a) slept b) sheltered from the torrential rain c) checked into another Wild Rover (I know, but there's a free t-shirt involved if we stay in all three) and d) paid for our Inca Trail which starts in two days, so I can't really comment on the
city yet. Needless to say, I'm a little excited for the next week, the triple whammy of the Inca Trail, Machu Picchu and the Euros starting should keep things fairly exciting.
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