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Published: April 14th 2011
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Road to Sucre
A small village between Uyuni and Potosi. We needed to be in La Paz by the 18th March, so we decided that we had time to head over to Sucre, the white city, 9 hours away from Uyuni. Unfortunately the journey turned out to be our worst yet in South America, due to the the fact that we were both sick. Our guide book stated the scenery was spectacular, but to keep our minds off our stomachs we tried to close our eyes and forget we were locked on a packed bus with no means of communicating with the driver and travelling on some of the poorest roads we had ever seen. We were relieved to reach Sucre that evening.
Although we still didn't feel great in the morning we had only until 7pm to explore the city before leaving for La Paz (and a bike ride down the world's most dangerous road), so we set out to do as much as we could. Sucre is different from any other Bolivian city; it is noticably cleaner and every building in the centre must be painted white, thus giving it it's bright and striking appearance.
We climbed the mini Eiffel Tower (which felt very unstable!) and spent
an hour walking around an incredible convent, still used by nuns today. The design of the building (with meditation benches on the roof) was spectacular, and the bell tower provided great views of the white city below. Sucre is the sort of city you can spend little time in but still appreciate and understand its uniqueness; we both agreed it was one of our favourite cities we had visited in South America.
That evening we headed for La Paz; again it was an uncomfortable ride due to still feeling unwell, but 13 hours later we had made it. La Paz is set in a bowl, surrounded by mountains which have houses sprawled up their sides. Entering the city from the top is a breathtaking sight; it seems such a bizarre place to build a large settlement. We got to our hotel early morning and dumped our bags before heading out to briefly check out the city centre. On our way to the main street we passed a woman throwing rocks at people in the street...while a policeman just stood and watched! Crazy stuff!
We were both quite tired from the bus ride so the rest of the day
was spent relaxing and getting our bearings. We did pass through the Witches' Market, which sold everything from alpaca socks to llama foetuses - nice. We just went for the socks! La Paz is not a huge city (about 1 million inhabitants) so the task of plotting our own city tour wasn't too daunting.
The next day we explored the city in more detail, starting at the main square, Plaza Murillo. The day treated us to some sunshine so the government buildings and cathedral looked good. The pigeons just reminded us of Trafalgar Square! The best way to really get a feel for a city is just to wander around, so we ambled to our next destination but made sure we explored all the little side streets and alleys that looked interesting.
After passing the infamous San Pedro prison (you used to be able to take tours round it quite easily but there have been a few incidents involving tourists and deportations, so we thought it best not to try!) we headed to El Monticulo, a lookout point for the city. Given La Paz's setting it provided quite a landscape. From here we walked through Sopocachi (the posh
The hospital
The tall building is a very picturesque hospital. district!) towards the huge Parque Central, which was pretty full of people due to a Doors gig at the open air theatre. We then headed back up the hill to our hotel, ready for the necessary early night.
The next day was the activity we had been looking forward to most in La Paz - cycling the world's most dangerous road. We joined a tour group early and set off for La Cumbre, a 4700m summit which would signal the start of the ride. Early morning at this height was unsurprisingly cold, but the tour group had kitted us out with big jackets so it wasn't too bad. After checking our (very good quality) bikes we were good to go.
The first 25km or so was easy - a new, paved double-track highway which provided no surprises but plenty of wonderful scenery. We made sure we stopped often for pictures - and we had to stop at a drugs check point anyway! After a short uphill bit (which we jumped back on the bus for!) we arrived at the start of the tough bit. Ahead was about 40km of downhill, fast, gravel track; sometimes no more than a
few metres wide. On the edge of a huge cliff with 1000m drops. And it was raining. Gulp! Let's go!
Each time we stopped we would hear more stories about how people had died falling over the edge (or pushed), so we made sure we held on tight, wishing we could stay close to the mountain side - local policy is for those going downhill to stay cliff side - mental! We weren't the quickest (some people actually raced down!), but once we had left the cloud behind we got the most amazing views, so we took our time to enjoy them. The whole ride took about 5 hours and was an incredible experience - it really lived up to our expectations and it was definitely as hair-raising as Top Gear showed!
We ended in a small town called Yolosa (1100m above sea level - it was nice to be low again!) and its animal reserve, La Senda Verde. We checked out the monkeys, had a good buffet lunch and headed straight for our next adrenaline filled activity - a zip line across the valley. Well, 3 zip lines actually. The best part of this were the views
as we flew over the river from one side of the valley to the other.
Once back in Yolosa the group headed back to La Paz, but we felt the area deserved more attention so we headed to Coroico, a small mountainside village 8km away. The hostel we stayed in had great views of the Yungas valleys; we just sat and watched the sun go down over the mountains - a perfect way to relax after a long bike ride.
The next day we spent a bit of time walking around the village, which we were pleased to find unspolit by tourism. It retained a real rural Bolivian character and was a lovely place to spend a day. Later on we headed back to La Paz (on the safer new road), ready to join a three-week tour to Lima...
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