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Published: January 12th 2008
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Zach on Rock
We made a stop on the roadside to play on some pretty cool rocks Hey!! So we are currently in Bolivia but I thought I'd catch up on the end of our time in Peru.
So we spent nearly a week in Puno on Lake Titicaca. Not that there was much to do in Punu but the hostel was really awesome, I didn't want to travel on my birthday, AND we both weren't feelin too hot. So we spent most of the days wandering this HUGE market that, like every market so far, has sold EVERYTHING. The strangest thing for sale was YELLOW underwear. Everywhere you looked there were yellow panties, boy shorts, boxers, thongs, you name it. We didn't find out till new years eve that apparently its good luck to wear yellow underwear on new years eve. When we weren't wandering the market or eating Ramen (or Zachs specialty of a fried egg sandwich) we watched bootleg dvds at the hostel. We did go on one adventure to the Uros Floating Islands. It was a trip! The islands are in the middle of Lake Titicaca and are made completely of reeds that grow on the lake. I mean COMPLETELY. Everything from the hoses, to the beds, to their boats (which looked like
The Red Lagoon
One of the red lagoons we saw. If you look really close you can see flamigos! viking ships), to the chairs, were made of reeds. The 50 some islands literally float around the lake. They are about 30 feet wide and their depth depends on their age, since they are constantly adding on to the tops of the islands. They can last about 50 years and if there is a fight on the island they cut the entire island in half to avoid confrontation. It was really crazy. They make all their money off tourists, they have all kinds of tapestry and restaurants and other artsy things. I talked to one of the girls that lived there, turned out she was 17 and married. It was sort of sad to see these people living like this when a big city was just across the lake. I could be making the wrong assumption but I'm pretty sure they are kept there for tourist sake. So New Years Eve in Peru... AWESOME! Zach and I bought tons of fireworks (they were SO SO cheap) and showed the non-americans what a real New Years Eve is about. They thought we were crazy... im pretty sure Zach lighting his fireworks with a cigarette really didn't help. hehe. We did all
the fireworks on the roof and so did everyone else in the city. It was spectacular to see tons and tons of fireworks shooting into the sky from the rooftops. Our hostel owners even fed us dinner (which was great except for one meat I couldn't identify...) and gave us champagne. As for my 21st birthday it was, well, uneventful. The hostel owners got me a delicious cake and Zach took me out to dinner. I had steak (the normal kind from a cow) and he has alpaca... which is really popular in Peru. I guess the fact that the whole continent could drink legally since they were 18 and usually well before that kinda puts a damper on an American's 21st but hey it was alright.
So we left Peru on the 3rd and headed across Lake Titicaca (us on one boat and our bus on another...crazy!). The ride wasn't bad and we didn't have too much trouble crossing the border. We paid our $100 US citizen visa fee and made copies of all our documents and all was well. We arrived in La Paz in complete shock. The city is HUGE and completely surrounded by mountains. We
explored the black market (which really wasnt very cheap...sadly no HD TVs are being sent home) and ate some really good street food. Right when we were getting back to the hostel two other couples who we had met before were headed out to a 3 day trip on the salt flats... and wanted us to come. SO I packed our bag super fast, checked out of the hostel, booked the trip via the hostel tourist office, and Zach ran (literally, which is pretty taxing at this altitude) to the ATM to get us the required cash. All this happened in 15 minutes and with only 30 minutes till the bus left. Talk about random. And totally worth it! The four other people were SO much fun (2 canadian and 2 from the States). The bus ride was about 13 hours to Uyini and it was freezing! Luckily, unlike our Cusco bus, this company provided blankets. We got to the tiny town, had some breakfast, and waited for our 4x4 to arrive. Which was late. As was everything else. So the 6 of us plus a driver and his wife, our cook piled into the Land Cruiser and we were
Me...
trying to not fall in the water! off. We stopped first at a train graveyard, which was cooler than it sounds. We climbed on the old rusty trains and the boys pretended to be tough pushing around old equipment. Then it was off to the Salt Flats. AMAZING! The salt went on forever and ever in every direction. We had a lot of fun taking goofy pictures and eating our llama lunch. The man that owned the Salt Hotel (made ENTIRELY of salt) was a huge jerk and made us by something ("QUICKLY!) just to look around inside. Oh well, it was worth it! So, since it had rained we didnt get to go to one of our destinations, apparently it was too dangerous, so we drove into the desert to a teeny tiny town to spent the night. On the way there *side note all the roads we traveled on were UNPAVED* we pulled over and chased llamas, took pictures, and just a had a really good time in the middle of NOWHERE. The hotel was nice and the food or cook made was alright. We woke up the next day to drive farther into the desert seeing an amazing Red Lagoon, thousands and thousands of
View
The view from the mountain near the tiny place we stayed the last night. flamingos, and tons of enormous rocks that appeared to have fallen out of the sky. The whole ride was just one big "how the heck did ___ get here?" The end of that day was spent at a very sad looking hotel in yet another teeny tiny town (by this I mean 50 people and less than 30 mud buildings). We had dinner, played cards, and drank wine. The last day of our trip we woke up at 430 AM. We piled into the 4x4 and headed to our final destinations. The first was an amazing gyser surrounded by volcanoes. In the early morning sun it really look awesome. We actually got to walk right up to the edge of an active volcano! We saw the bubbling mud and everything! It was crazy! The last stop was a a huge green lagoon (ya gotta see the pictures to understand how cool these lagoons were) with more flamingos! All of this is also at an elevation of 4000-4800 meters, thats 3 miles! We also saw some fox and LOTS of llamas and sheep. So we get back to Uyni have our last dinner with the Canadians (I miss them already!) and
thought our adventure had ended when we got on the bus at 8...
WRONG!! The bus (remember on non-paved, VERY bumpy, bolivian roads) traveled slowly at first and then I woke up to it not moving at all. I went back to sleep thinking it was a minor thing and it would all be fine. I woke up at dawn to the bus in the SAME spot. Apparently the rain had caused some buses ahead of ours to stuck in the mud and it was too dangerous to move them until dawn. Everyone got off the bus to see what was up and, thankfully, we were on our way again about an hour after the sun came up. It was an amazing view though, sun coming up over the snowcapped mountains in the desert... not bad. We stopped for breakfast. And then we stopped for a broken break shoe on our bus, then stopped for another stuck bus (which Zach and about 15 other guys helped push out), then we stopped for a cracked rim on our bus! Over all the 13 hour trip too 24 hours. Surprisingly no one complained and everyone was pretty upbeat. (Everyone does
warn against the buses in Bolivia... now I know why) So now we are back at our favorite hostel in La Paz, and just said good-bye to our other 2 travel buddies.
So that seemed long... but its really brief actually. Bolivia has definitely been the most fun by far and hopefully it will get even better. So yea, check out the pics! (OK... so my camera is gettin fixed and Zach is workin on getting his up... Soooo pics soon!!)
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A.D.
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shamoo the pig
Hon! I am soooo glad you are having the time of your life. I love the blog and am so happy you have a "forever record" of your trips. Thanks you so much for the bracelet - I love it!!! Think of you all the time. Tell Zach , hi. Love, AD