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Published: February 12th 2008
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The original reason for my whole South Peruvian trip was exit Peru as my
tourist visa was about to expire (90 days). I crossed the
frontera on January 1, 2008, the last day I was ‘allowed’ to be in Peru. Generally, the rule is that if you overstay your tourist visa, then you have to pay $1 for every extra day that you stayed, which is reasonable. However, corruption is a lucrative business in Latin America so you never know how much you might get stuck with paying.
So I caught a bus from Puno (Peru) to Copacabana (Bolivia), which included the border crossing. The interesting thing is that the
frontera is a semi-open one. The
frontera is represented by the
arco that you have to pass on foot to get to the Bolivian side and vice versa. However, the immigration offices are meters away from the arch and the border people stay inside their offices. So technically, the bus drops you off in front of the Peruvian immigration, but no one checks if you go inside. So you can just fumble about, pass the arch, pretend you went to the Bolivian immigration, and afterwards get back on
your bus. And I did meet people who had skipped the immigration altogether because of passport issues and they were fine - nothing happened. So that’s some info in case you want to smuggle something into Bolivia or Peru 😊
After changing money on the Peruvian side (Peru has soles, Bolivia has bolivianos), I passed the
arco and go to
Bolivian immigration. The immigration guy is not very nice and suddenly starts saying that Croatians need a visa and that it would cost 230 bolivianos (around $35). That was definitely not in my budget and I wasn’t sure what to do. I had conveniently forgotten to check whether I needed a visa for Bolivia and there was no internet at the border (the immigration offices looked very poor). So the guy is waving around a very old printout of all the countries needing visas and Croatia is on it. I was hesitant enough for the guy to ask his supervisor in the other room. It turned out that Bolivia’s current president, Evo Morales, had eliminated the visa requirement for Croatia. That made me very happy and after getting my Bolivian stamp I was on my way to Copacabana.
View of Copacabana
from Niño Calvario. I stopped in Copacabana twice, on the way to La Paz, and then on my way back to Peru. A very touristy town, but small and strangely appealing, I quite enjoyed my time there.
Niño Calvario , also known as Seroka, and by its original name, Kesani, is a small but prominent hill a 15-min walk from Copacabana’s modest center. There is an irregular trail uphill to the
Horca del Inca, an odd trilithic gate, and if you continue climbing (preferably in your mountain shoes and not flip-flops like me!) you can get all the way to the top of the hill; the view is amazing. Although strenuous, it was a nice experience (more so the view and resting part, than the actual walk, lol).
Other Copacabana sites included the
beach (which was nice), the
Museo del Poncho (which I was so excited about visiting but it was the Three Kings holiday and the museum was closed. I still haven’t gotten over it), and the
salchipapas vendor stand.
The
salchipapas were so good that they deserve their own paragraph 😊 So I’m walking around Copacabana, starving, looking for something to eat. I finally get to the
market area and everybody is selling something; mostly chicken though! Lol. Chicken is so big in Latin America. All of a sudden I see a girl in her little vendor stand frying potatoes. So I go and ask her if she has
papas fritas and she says no. I’m confused and I hang out nearby to see what others will order. Some boys come and they order
salchipapas, which turned out to be
papas fritas with some kind of meaty salami/cut-up hotdog on top. So I order
salchipapas for the potatoes and the meat part turns out to be really good. Needless to say, I had
salchipapas for dinner two nights in a row. I even had seconds, lol.
Copacabana was an enjoyable stop for a day or two. More than that would have been boring + their internet was crazy expensive.
Spanish Word of the Day:
frontera =
border *
Next stop: Isla del Sol
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Ivanchica
non-member comment
Ba je super ova pensative slika... Ba i je, pensative :P Ja sma jednom ila od Zagreba do svetita u Mariji Bistrici (dakle, 4, 5 sati HODA) u svojim Doc Martensicama. I was THAT cool. Never again, tho. hehe...