Flying HIgh in La Paz

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La Paz is a city at a high altitude. It is built in the crater of a volcano and at night from the President hotel restaurant windows overlooking the whole city you get a speectacular view. It is like standing in the middle of the night sky with all the nights surrounding you like stars. There are some dark patches unlit by the electric lights one in the shape of Australia without Tasmania on the bottom.
Money here is confusing looks like a lot such as $108 for a main meal but when you dvivide it by seven for AUS it only ends up costing around $15AUS. I got out about $300 Bolivianos thinking that would last the couple of days but didn,t realise how much it really was in $AUS.
We spent half the first day in La Paz doing a morning tour of the area which included a gold museum of artifacts taken from the famous archeological site we saw the day before, the city square plaza which every city has, a viewpoint so high it was starting to snow, the Luna landscape park which looked quite scary and reminded me of the badlands and the Witches market.
It is a bustling city vibrant with contraditions such as the witches market where dead alpaca babies hang along side patchmama offering baskets and herbal potions for better sex and the busy professional people heading to the office for work. Linda is still feeling the effects of high altitude so we didnt walk too far in the afternoon just around the block and back for a coffee.
They have a curious system here for encouraging people and cars to use the zebra road crossing system. At breakfast we watched while a group of about 12 people dressed up in zebra costumes and a couple of donkey outfits headed down past our hotel into the centre of the town. Here they joke and prance about congratulating and encouraging people and cars who use the crossing correctly and making those who don't use it correctly get a friendly telling off. At the end of the day they all start heading back to where they came from .. quite a funny site and good to watch them in action.
Last supper with kiwis tonight. Had a good meal but everyone a little quieter knowing our time together is nearly over. How lucky we have been to have such a great group. Our tour guide left earlier today to get back across to the Peru side before the border closes again. He has only two days before he heads off with another group coming in from Ecuador and doing the Inca trail again as part of their tour. Lucky him. Glad it is not me even if I am pleased to have done it. Not an experience I want to do again at this stage anyway.
Early breakfast before taxi to the airport to begin our journey home.

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