La Paz the highest capital in the world

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After our relaxing time on Isla Del Sol it was back to Cocacabana for the bus to La Paz the highest capital city in the world at 3660m. Due to its height they even have oxygen on hand at the airport to help passengers cope with the sudden change in altitude.

The bus journey was easy enough and took 4 hours but we didn´t mind as the views along the way were amazing. La Paz it self is a huge city built in a canyon surrounded by steep slopes which over time have become even more and more inhabited mainly by the poorer people and apparently these slopes are one of the fastest growing cities in Latin America.

Whilst in La Paz we mainly shopped for presents and souveners all very cheap so we got a bit giddy and sent a further 5kg package home, theres going to be a lot of shit to go through when we get home! Whilst shopping we got pestered a lot by the shoe shine boys and at first they look scarey with their ski masks and baseball caps on and your just waiting for them to rob you! We got talking to a few and they were very friendly and just doing what they can to earn some money for their family or to pay for studying. They wear the mask to avoid any sort of social stigma as its such a low paid job about 12p a shine and because of this they don´t want anybody to notice them.

One ot the interesting things we did was go to a Coco Museum which explains the history of the coco leaf and how it is used in the present day. It was good eye opener and shows how the Incas used it to cope with altitude sickness and to give them extra strength compared to how the western world broke it down to its biological form and then added other chemicals to get the modern drug addicted cocaine. One of the interesting facts was how Coca Cola first used coca leaves in their product and advertised it as an energy drink which at the time would have been true but then they had to take the ingredient out at the start of the 20th century due to new drug laws!

There was nothing special about La Paz itself but it was a good base camp for a number of trips we did. The main ones being La Paz to Coroico on the death road by mountain bike! The trip itself is getting famous with backpackers and something we have been looking forward to. The other trip was to Rurrenbaque. See the separate blogs for both those trips.

One trip we did close by to La Paz was to the ruins of Tiwanaku which have been dated from 600 bc to 700 ad and were pretty impressive. There were lots of huge megaliths upto 175 tons in weight, lots of the buildings have been partially restored so you had a good idea of what they once looked like. Some very similar to the Incan ruins we have seen.

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Photos

Street Sellers
I have never seen so many different potatoes! You could even by them peeled as the women would sit there all day peeling the spuds for lazy customers!