Bolivia border crossing - Villazon to Tupiza

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Now i´ve of course read about Bolivia. Its renowned for being a hard place to travel around, or at least it used to, its renowned for coca leaf production and therefore keeping half of Europe and Americas noses powdered and its renowned for its crazy llama textiles and clothing. In the last few days we have experiences all of this (NOT the powdered nose bit, just the leaf!!!), and more.
As soon as we arrived at the Argentina/Bolivia border we could tell it wasnt going to be an easy crossing. For starters, we had to queue for about an hour, for no obvious reason. We were literally queuing like we were at a ticket kiosk, small hole in a window, scary looking man with a big gun sat there taking about half and hour to look at everyones passports. Given i look like Ian Beal from Eastenders in mine and the pic was taken in 1999 i was convinced i was going to have some trouble getting in. Luckily, i didnt and after about a 2 hour wait we literally ´walked´ into Bolivia! No security check, nothing, just a vacant stare from the immigratiuon dude, a nod and then a almight great stamp and in you go. I do like these walking border crossing becasue for a short period you are actually in no mans land, just stood on a bridge between two countries, like you dont exist, its quite cool!
Anyway, the shenanigans continued when we walked from Bolivia immigration up to the bus station. Immediatly we were all finding it really hard to breathe. Altitide had kicked in big time. I dont think we had realised how high we had climed on the buses since leaving Salta in Argentina. The air is just so so thin! Its crazy, you actually have to take really short breaths and any kind of overexertion like simply picking up your bag makes you a little out of breath. At one point Jess was getting full on chest pains, quite scaryt given we had only been walking for about 20 minutes. Anyway, after a load of agua (that means water, i think it sounds better than water) we had booked our bus to our first town in Bolivia, Tupiza, about 3 hours from the border in southern Bolivia. Now, i know i had moaned a bit about bus journeys, but the next 3 hours of our lives are actually almost indescribable...Given we had travelled around Argentina and Brazil in luxury versions of National Express/Greyhounds, we didnt expect quite the same standard in Bolivia, but perhaps something close....We started to wonder though when we bought our tickets, just 25 Bolivianos each, thats 4 aussie dollars and about 1 pound 80. Then we noticed that all of the péople waiting for the bus were Bolivian, all with screaming babies and hige cargo bags of fabric and food. No other gringos but us. Erm, ok, so we´ve just seen about 500 other backpackers crossing the border and the onl other option is the train, but surely we wouldnt be the only ones getting the bus? Yes we were, and i will tell you why.
Firstly, when the bus turned up it looked like it had been used for an explosion scene in some movie, it was absolutely knackered, covered in dust and an engione rattling so loud you expected to see it fall out of the bottom at any minute. Next we had to hand over our bags for the hold and we watched in horror as our as yet relatively shiney bags, immedialty got shoved amonsgt a sack of dirty spuds and covered in dust. Next we had to actually climb onto the bus and i watched in amazement as old Bolivian women, about 2 ft tall did it with such grace whilst us idiots in our innappropriate flip flops clambered on like a bunch of happy campers. Next the seats, well you cant really call them that, you get the picture. No cushioning and the one in front of me had locked in its recline position so i was nose to dusty velvet the whole way. The bus was absolutely boiling inside and the windows were locked shut, dont ask me why, nothing about this bus made sense or made you bveleive it was actually able to transport you anywhere.
I could go on, but when we finnaly left, all just laughing so hard at this ridiculous situation we were in it got so ridiculous we were actually almost wetting oursleves with laughter, thank god we all had a good sense of hunour. Firstly our three hour trip had no roads. We were driving, about 40km an hour along dirt tracks, through baron, baron land, dry, hot dusty and with vertical drops either side of the road that at any poiunt we could have tipped into. Then the vibrations began. Given this bus suspesnion had almost defintiely packed in in 1979, and we were driving along dirt tracks and over rocks that you could barely climb over, this bloody great tin of a bus was shaking like mad! We could feel every piece of fat on our bodies wobbling, our teeth chattering, our heads bobbing up and down, dust filling the bus making us cough our guts up. Jess summed it up nicely when i looked over and she was holding her boobs in place and screaming ´i need a sports bra!!!´ It was that bumpy and crazy we were literally being thrown out of our seats. I swear we would have lost a few kilos on that trip, it was like being strapped into one of those vibrating belt gym machines for 3 hours!! The craziets part was then the ´road´ was unnavigable so the driver just drove over the edge into the river and started burning it up a river!!! At that point we had lost it and were just in utter amazement at it all. Had we had we done the bus trip at the end of our time in Bolivia, it probasbly would have washed over us as having been here for nearly a week now, its all making sense, but after just a few minutes of crossing the border it was a really smack in the face! But, i loved it, it´s how we should be travelling, luxury buses are too easy!

Tupiza was a nice little town and was literally a two night pit stop before we headed out on our 3 day jeep tour of south west Bolivia. Interestingly, Tupiza was the location for the filming of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid, so we felt obliged to go and have a bit of explore around the area...via horseback! I´ve always been a keen rider, but for Nat, putting her on a horse is like telling her she cant ever go to topshop again, it terrifies her. The four of us went on an absolutely awesome 3 hour horse trek around amazing canyons and arid, dry red landscapes with crazy gorges and awesome cactus everywhere! Our ´guide´ was a non english speaking 14 year old riding bare back which was a bit crazy, but it was incredible to do and so so cheap. We are going to spend so little here! A hostel is about 8 aussie dollars a night (3 quid) and a massive pizza is about 5 aussie dollars. Yes, i know its crap to be eating pizza in Bolivia but i´m not quite ready for the llama hoof stew yet thanks.

After tow nights in Tupiza we headed off on our 3 day, 2 night tour of sotuh west bolivia and we have just finihsed and we are exhausted and amazed. We have covered 1280km in three days, at altidudes of up to 4095 metres and seen some of the most amazing animals and landscapes ever. That´ll be up next, i need to get my brain in order to remember it all its been so incredible!

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