http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from South America , Bolivia , Cochabamba Department en-us Sun, 12 Oct 2008 05:45:28 BST Sun, 12 Oct 2008 05:45:28 BST Parque Machia http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-332678.html Hospital og Boernehjem http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-332671.html Dage i Cochabamba La Paz og Foerste dag i Villa Tunari.Dag 1 i Cochabamba. Vi har nu en hel dag i byen og har planlagt at vi vil op i bjergene og se Inkaruiner.En lille byen ca. 20 km fra Cochabamba vi tog en bus som koerte os til Sipe Sipe dvs vi kom til at koere for langt og maatte staa af in the midle of no where. Puha hvad skulle vi goere. En af de der private taxere kom og vi hoppede i http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-332340.html After spending spending an extra cold night in Uyuni due the one and only cash machine in town running out of money and us not having enough cash on us to get a bus out of there until the machine was refilled we eventually arrived in Cochabamba. The bus journey there was terrible. We took a night bus and the driver seemed to think it was reasonable to play Bolivian pop music at full blast through http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-321344.html This past weekend my friend Sebastian and I took off to a smaller town about four hours from Cochabamba. After a bit of a harrowing drive in a micro bus mini van whose driver courageously passed slower cars and trucks while going around very tight turns with little vision of oncoming traffic we arrived in the sleepy town of Oruro. It was late and we hadnt really made a plan for a hotel so i http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-319748.html As part of my homestay costs I recieve breakfast lunch and dinner each day. Althought strange to be served my meals everyday I have had the chance to try some interesting cuisine. The Grandmother of the house Dido usually prepares the lunches since she is retired and spends her days at the house. The other day I came home from work ready for a big meal. As an aside many families here hav http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-314296.html This week there is a huge festival in a town outside of the city called Quillacollo. It is the Festival of the Virgin Urkupia The legend is that a shepherd girl from a poor family was out on the Orkupia hillsides one day and an image of a celestial woman appeared in front of her. The woman told her to pick up some stones at her feet and take them home to her family. When the girl arrived a http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-312492.html Yesterday the Bolivian people voted in a referendum for or against the current president Evo Morales. Things are pretty heated right now as there is a very strong divide between Bolivians. My host family invited me to go with them to vote. Another volunteer came over to the house to join us and around 11 we walked to the nearby school where they vote. The law states that no cars are permitted http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-310932.html ...loved this place ...had so much magic to it..please find a picture medley there maybe a couple of pages. http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/blog-310239.html Hi allSo much has happend since the last blog entry from the nazca we got on the nicest bus to arequipa and woke up quite fresh. We stayed at the point hostal again however this one wasnt as lively as the lima one. We met up whith a couple of ppl in the hostal and had a little look around the town that day there was a protest on about something or other but it was interesting to see. Then went http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-309597.html Last weekend I was invited by three other volunteers to travel to a small town south of Cochabamba called Toro Toro. While a fairly ambigous little town it is surrounded by some of the most beautiful and historic parts of the country. I had little knowledge of what Toro Toro was all about or really what I was getting into. I had thought maybe it would be better to stick around the city to get http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-309425.html Sorry for the huge post but there is much to say about the past 5 weeks volunteering and living with the monkeys at Parque Machia in the jungle in Bolivia. There are three main types of monkeys at Inti Wara Yassi. The first the capuchins are hightly intelligent. One of the smarter capuchins Boodie the alpha male has actually escaped three times from a locked cage in the clinic. It is though http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-308042.html Communidad Inti Wara Yassi is a wildlife refuge in Bolivia that is home to an enormous array of previously injured poached domesticated sick and circus animals including pumas oscillots tayras tajons monkeys of many sorts birds tortoises and one enormous Andean bear. It is staffed almost entirely by volunteers who work with one sort of animal or in one area of the park. The park gets no g http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-308039.html Well after a long and exhausting two day trip I have safely and succesfully made it to Cochabamba. For those who hadn't heard I missed both AM flights in La Paz and the afternoon flights were totally booked. That meant I had to sit around the airport the entire day until 730 pm when the next flight left. That was pretty awful. Anyways I arrived last night around 8 pm. One of the Sustaina http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-306830.html It is not easy to know where to start with an adventure like this. To begin with this entry will cover a period of almost 4 weeks so thats a lot to cram in Please accept our apologies for the length there is just so much to tell.Before we left we both discussed our desire to volunteer with animals or children in every country we were to visit if it was possible. Unfortunately we soon realised t http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-304123.html Our next sojourn out of La Paz was to head for Lake Titicaca and Isla Del Sol Island of the sun the birthplace of the Sun according to the Incas. We were trying to decide whether to go to Lake Titicaca from Peru or Bolivia. After talking with people and reading up a bit about it all we decided on going from Copacabana in Bolivia. Apparently there is a lot of tension between the locals and the http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-303315.html Hello boys and girls. We expect you're very bored of these blogs by now but we'll keep soldiering on. Like talking to someone who lost consciousness years ago we feel it's important to keep whittering away in the faint hope that our words will offer some comfort. In fact let's start with some news for those that don't know. We're due back in England on 20th December which is less than 5 months http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Villa-Tunari/blog-302828.html Buenos NochesI finally have some downtime in Lima. Liz left tonight and I look forward to a rest after 2 weeks of constant travel I will be staying in Lima at Loki Hostel once again for tonight and Saturday night. I plan on getting some Laundry done tomorrow as well as making some progress on the planning of the second leg of my trip.So the past few days have been nonstop. After spending 2 ni http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-301657.html During this last week in Bolivia I decided to change locations and started working at an orphanage by the name of Cuidadera. Come to find out there are over 200 orphanages in Cochabamba alone. Most of the kids at Cuidadera are evidence of the lack of birth control education in Bolivia and unfortunately many of them are also the products of drug abusing parents. There are seventysome kids at t http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-297076.html Im working on writing about the last couple of weekends... hopefully Ill have it posted by tomorrow. I just recently started working on a documentary about life in Cochabamba that is taking up a lot of my time... the group Im working with is very talented and Im learning a lot about filmmakingMore on all that later...Love and Miss you allKatie http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-294608.html My first weekend adventure had left me anxious to travel more...The second weekend I ended up traveling with a group of friends to La Paz one of the biggest cities in Bolivia that I had mentioned before. We took a bus after work at 2 and didnt arrive until 10. Its actually really cheap to travel in Bolivia. 40 bolivianos or about 5 U.S. dollars for a oneway trip. Gorgeous ride through the mo http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-293710.html Whether or not to visit Torotoro National Park was probably our toughest 'where to go' decision yet but in the end we decided that there are only a few places in the world where you can see dinosaur footprints so we sucked it up and paid for a private tour as the only practical way we could visit the Park. The Park is actually in Potosi department but it can only be accessed via Cochambamba. It http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-292812.html Its all in the little things. For example...Toby the dog that has made the clinic his home greets me every morning as if Ive known him for a lifetime.Even though in general the service can be lacking and unbearably slow the people here respond by being that much more patient and understanding.On nearly every major street corner you can find a child juggling for spare change.Whenever a bus s http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-292076.html So we've gone down in the world literally. Cochabamba is only at a height of 2558m so only just at high altitude. Its the lowest we've been since San Pedro and its so warm The shorts are back out 1st time since Puerto Igazua and only the 2nd time this trip it doesn't even go cold at night.Cochambamba sits in a 'bowl' surrounded by big mountains and the views on the way here were amazing ve http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-292073.html Last week was filled with work fiestas and dancing... Projects Abroad had a social for all the volunteers where we grilled out and watched a local group perform the native dances of Cochabamba. They were decked out in crazy costumes that once again only pictures can describe working on that. Last Wednesday a group of us went to the Cine Centre movie theater and saw Narnjia. I was assuming http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-291592.html My work.As stimulating as it is to explore a new world and culture so completely different from my own working in Cochabamba is definitely my favorite thing to do. Ive been working for a week and half now at the Centre de Salud Sarcobamba a small health center in Cochabamba. It consists of a small onestory building that provides service for mainly pregnant women and children from the ages of http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-290808.html Dont worry Dad Im alive and well... just dont have time to write right now... http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-289046.html Alright so more on Toro Toro...I completely forgot to mention that the reason we went to this desolate town in the first place was because its known for its caves canyons and dinosaur footprints. Crazy When we arrived on Saturday we met our guide Luis and immediately headed for the caves. It was about a 20 minute walk to get to the entrance and once we did I knew I was in for a great time http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-289028.html My trip to Toro Toro...Within 24 hours of getting here I was already leaving. At 5 in the morning Francizka and I woke up and took a taxi to the center of the city where we negotiated prices for a driver to take us to Torro Torro a small city about 6 hours away. A couple of the people that I had met earlier went with us along with some new faces. There was Sarah another girl from Germany Tenek http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-288576.html I made it And what a wild ride it was. After a solid 24 hours three flights and enough terrible airplane food to last me a lifetime I finally landed in Cochabamba on Friday at 8 in the morning. For some reason I was three hours earlier than when I was supposed to land so I had to use a phone in the airport to call the Projects Abroad Office so they could pick me up. My phone had long ago http://www.travelblog.org//South-America/Bolivia/Cochabamba-Department/Cochabamba/blog-288189.html