Day 40 - Bolivian Night Bus

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We spent the morning planning and re-planning our time in Bolivia. We had intended to head to Tupiza, the land of cowboys and the demise of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid, to stage our own horseback epic but with trains so infrequent and buses leaving at 6am we changed our destination to Sucre, Bolivia's judicial capital (La Paz has become the governmental capital). Soph and I booked a night bus to Sucre, leaving at 7 that evening and due in Sucre at 4am! At least we would save a night's accommodation and maximise our time in both places! Plus the tickets were a steal at just a fiver each!

We maximised the benefit of our hotel by having a shower just before check out and headed off for a late lunch, another almuerzo. This time we got a small salad, soup, fried chicken with rice and rice pudding. Amazing! Obviously Soph persuaded me a trip back for cake for dessert was a good idea later in the afternoon.

Aware of the reputation of Bolivian buses we locked up our big backpacks, zipping straps in and adding rain covers before loading them on the bus. There were a few other backpackers, but mainly locals, many in traditional dress with packs made of colourful cloth. Our security awareness was heightened when in our seats the lady from the office singled us out and told us to take great care of our day bags before we set off! I think we now feel very close to our bags having strapped them to our legs and hugged them for pretty much the whole journey, asleep or not!

How Sophie Sees It

No matter how hard I try - even if my vocab, grammar and pronunciation is correct (or as good as it'll get), something always gets lost in translation. I specifically asked the woman when we bought our bus tickets "how many hours does the journey last?". She replied solely with "9", so we calculated an arrival time of 4am after leaving at 7pm. And without a toilet on board I thought this would be a struggle enough as it was. But 4am, 5am and 6am rolled on by... and we realised that by simply saying the word "9", the lady had in fact meant we would be arriving at 9am! Luckily we had stopped at midnight at a cafe where I could relieve my bladder (although not in the toilet of the cafe as you would expect... the did not have one.. I had to go al fresco! Like Taryn said.. whenever we say "well, you would expect...." we are always mistaken!). What an unpleasant journey it was too - the smell on board (I have no idea what it was) made me feel nauseous for the entire 14 hours, despite my hopes that I would become accustomed to it. And the "semi-cama" description actually meant that my chair reclined a few centimetres if I pushed hard enough (but I could not hold it there) and the chair in front of me reclined far enough to crush my knees and force me to keep my legs outstretched (as much as it was possible to "stretch"). It was definitely built with a shorter framed person in mind. It also wasn't well adapted to a night time journey - we stopped about 30 times to pick up waifs and strays for cash in hand on the side for the driver and every time the lights and music came on.

Arriving at 9am was certainly better than 4am though, and Sucre looked beautiful.

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