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Published: January 13th 2008
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It’s hard to believe that we have now spent 3 weeks (on and off) in Santa Cruz. Okay, so we had a luxurious Christmas and have visited Vallegrande, Samaipata and Buena Vista, but the time has come to leave the comforts of this tropical city behind and head to the Amazon region.
We haven’t really done much in the city, especially since returning here in the New Year. We went out to nearby Cotoca one morning but most of the ceramic shops have closed now. Still, it was interesting to see the items for sale in the one remaining workshop. Unfortunately ceramics and rucksacks don’t go too well together so we were unable to buy anything. A lot of the small shops have been replaced by Internet cafes and telephone centres. Even the church was closed and it seems you need to go there during mass times now to visit.
So what have we been doing? The
Rio Magdalena Hostal (Calle Arenales 653) has been a great place to chill out by the pool or in a very comfortable room. The heat and humidity has taken a bit of getting used to too. It does seem that most of our time
Hostal Swimming Pool
Great for cooling off here has revolved around eating though!!
Santa Cruz is extremely cosmopolitan when it comes to food. It’s easy to find a good salad or a buffet restaurant. We have eaten great Japanese food (Restaurant Ken) and wonderful Mexican (El Chile). The Brazilian churrasco at Parque Urbano gave us an incredible amount of food to share! There’s even a donner kebab place now. Kimberley’s Kebab (La Paz & Ballivian) has been open for 4 months and they are considering moving to a bigger place. We had a great evening chatting, eating and drinking with the owners and their friends. It was an exhausting evening of Spanish conversation! The kebabs are great too.
GO THERE! But by a long, long way our favourite is still
La Casona where we have feasted on salmon, trout, pork and the best steak outside of Argentina. It’s a bit pricey for Bolivia but well worth a once a week treat!!
Eating isn’t everything though. We went out to the Rio Pirai where Trish attempted to wade across. It is said that you are not a true resident of the city until you have achieved this feat (Russ did it 3 years ago) but Trish
will have to wait a few more years. The quicksand made the crossing impossible within our risk limits!
It’s also coming up to Carnaval time. Normally associated with Brazil, it is taken very seriously in this area. The Carnaval Queen has already been selected and we managed to see a “preca”, or pre-Carnaval parade. It was colourful and musical with an Egyptian theme. This was a good taster for us and we can’t wait to get to Brazil for the real thing now!
So now we travel on. All being well we will fly at 7am tomorrow to Rurrenabaque. The runway there is made from earth so we need a dry night and morning to allow us to reach our destination!
I´ve also just noticed that this is my 100th entry! Hope you´re not bored!!!
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Natalie
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#100
Congrats on your hundredth entry!!! I wonder how many you'll have in the end...if there ever is an end!!! Keep it up, I love following you guys through your blog entries. I miss you both and wish you a Happy 2008!!!