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Published: October 16th 2009
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At 3660m above sea level, La Paz is the highest capital city in the world with its buildings clinging to the sides of the canyon and downwards. There are many alleys and markets in the centre of the city, with many of the indigenous women walking around with their long black plaits hanging from under their bowler hats selling all types of wares from food to magical goods. The women wear the hat on the side of their head if they are single and on top if they are married. The streets are full with traffic, mostly public transport collectivos or mini vans that have a person hanging out of the window or sliding door yelling out the destination and price. It was easier to follow a local to cross the road, otherwise it seemedlike the traffic would never let us pass. Transit police organise the streets and sometimes control the lights manually. Scary looking boys and men walk around with ski masks on, but they are just the shoe shine workers. It seems to be what they wear, so when you know that it marks their occupation, it isn so scary after all.
We arrived in La Paz a
day earlier, as we were told of a demonstration protest that would have prevented our bus from Copacobana to travel to La Paz on the Monday. Bolivia is known as the country of protests, but I like how they are polite enough to give the transport companies notice. We travelled with our Aussie friends, Natasha and Tina on a Titicaca bus into the city and were extremely happy with the location, cleaniness, hot water availability and security of the hotel we selected to stay at. La Paz has a reputatin for personal security issues and so we chose a posada with a good reputation, even though it was a lot more expensive than our usual hostals.
Our hotel is right near the Witches markets where little stalls sell herbs, magical potions and shrivelled llama fetuses that the locals bury under the porches of their new homes for luck. I went shopping with the girls and we found a large store with a large array of items on sale to fix every issue you could think of. We saw sticks to burn for sexual problems, love candles, dolls with lucky symbols, little ceramic Inca looking figurines representing different types of
Traditional dress
Many people were gathered for a protest in town luck and fortune and little bottles containing colourful material with golden plastic items inside, representing different types of luck. Some of the baby llamas had white fur on them and others were tiny, shrivelled and hair less.
Other non-witchy market stalls and shops in the area that we stayed in sold many alpaca products like scarves and sweaters, etc along with coca leaf trinkets and any other touristy item like postcards and magnets. All four of us went for a walk to the Black Market (a legitimate market even though its name doesn suggest that) and all we saw was a normal market selling everything from shoes to wool for knitting.
While Dan and the girls rode down the Worlds most dangerous road between La Paz and Coroico on mountain bikes, I visited Valle de La Luna (The valley of the moon). It is located 10km from the city centre and actually isn a valley, but an eroded maze of canyons and pinnacles made from sandstone and clay. The soil erodes very easily and so the formations can change from year to year depending on the strength of the wind and rain. There is a theory that the
Llama foetuses
Found at the witches markets Valley of the moon was once linked to Lake Titicaca, as marine fossils have been found there. The theory is that when the mountains in the Andes were formed, the valley was cut off from the lake.
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Dave
non-member comment
La Paz is not a capital city...
Sucre is the capital of Bolivia. :)