Cocaine piñatas anyone?

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Well, I think I´m almost a month behind in my blogs, so there might be a bit of catching up to do! From Cusco, we got a bus across to Copacabana in Bolivia. As far as South American bus rides go, this one was pretty standard, apart from a freezing three hour wait in the bus terminal at Puno on the Peruvian border. Upon arrival in Copacabana we checked into a hotel, as there were no hostels, lured by the promise of 24 hour hot water. Of course, we managed to pick the day when there was a blackout in the whole town so, as all the showers run on electricity, there were no hot showers for us. Copacabana is a quiet, very laid-back town which is set on Lake Titicaca. Its main drawcard is the nearby Isla del Sol, which can be accessed by ferry (which Susie and Andrew chose to do). The other way to get there is via a 17km walk round to the town of Yampupata and then a very short ferry trip (which Evans, Tucky and I did). Fortunately for us, we chose the second option as it was a really nice walk, through small towns with stunning scenery and, probably best of all, no other tourists. We did, however, manage to get nicely ripped off by the ferryman (insert Chris de Burgh jokes here) on the trip over to Isla del Sol, as we had to hire our own boat. We were very pleased to have done the walk, as the island turned out to be a huge disappointment, with very little to do.

From Copacabana we headed to La Paz. This should have been an easy four hour trip, but as nothing normal ever happens in South America, they decided to throw in a lake crossing which we hadn´t been told about. We were all herded off the bus without a word of explanation and onto a tiny boat which was rapidly filling with water. As we headed across the lake, the boat got its own barge across. Very bizarre, but we made it to La Paz safe and sound.

Interesting facts about La Paz:

- Bolivia prides itself on having the best cocaine in the world. You can buy it very easily, even at bars. In fact, some bars bring out piñatas full of cocaine on Saturday nights and people at the bar get to collect what comes out when it breaks.
- If you can´t find a toilet it is apparently socially acceptable just to go in the gutter, even on the busiest of streets.
- There are people dressed up as zebras who control the traffic at busy intersections.
- They have lollipops called Bon Bon Bums.

We´ve been in and around La Paz for about two weeks now, using it as a base for various activities. Our hostel, Wild Rover is very much the party hostel of La Paz and as such has been a very interesting place to stay. We´ve named our room ´The Black Hole´or ´The Room of Eternal Darkness´as it seems like it is constantly night time in there. People come in at randoms times and sleep on a rotational basis and there are no windows, which means it absolutely stinks and is not the nicest place to be in. Quite looking forward to getting out of the place actually (we leave for Potosi tonight) - it´s a bit frustrating when one can´t even go to the toilet because people are in there snorting cocaine. I´ve made it sound like a terrible place to stay, but it has been a lot of fun - probably time to move on now though.

Within La Paz we haven´t done too much. Highlights, however, include:

- Going to ´Cholitas Wrestling,´ the Bolivian equivalent of WWF. It was quite entertaining, especially when the crowd got involved by throwing fruit and bottles and heckling the wrestlers. It got a bit hideous, however, when they brought out female wrestlers dressed in their traditional clothes and made them fight men. The low point was when two women, one of whom was a dwarf, were matched up against a man. The man grabbed the dward by the plaits and started spinning her around, then set her hair on fire. Very strange night out!
- Wandering around the Witch´s Markets where one can buy everything from silverware and traditional Bolivian clothing to dried llama foetuses - very appealing!
- Eating: There are some pretty good restaurants in La Paz and, being the good eaters that we are, we´ve visited a few of them. The top two have been Marrakech for Moroccan and Thai Old Town for Japanese/Thai/Indian.
- Riding the Death Road: Bolivia is well-known for having terrible roads and this one is marketed as the ´World´s Most Dangerous Road´ - and rightly so. The road is 63km long and mostly downhill with a descent of 3500m. The first part is not too bad, you just ride down a steeped paved road as fast as you can, but you share it with trucks and buses which makes it a challenge. The second part, however, is a very narrow, gravel road with massively steep cliffs and no guard rails. We were very happy to go slowly at the start until we got some confidence up, especially after hearing that a 22-year-old guy had died riding it two weeks beforehand after falling close to 100m off a cliff. Apparently he was alive for about two hours, but the guides couldn´t get to him in time. Apart from that sad note, it was an amazing ride, once we got over the fear factor! I was especially pleased with my bike - they had to get a special junior sized one in for me, which looked like a red rocket and was appropriately named ´Howler.´

Our first excursion from La Paz was to check out the Amazonian wetlands near Rurrenabaque. We flew there on the world´s skinniest plane, a 20 seater which was so small that Evans could barely fit into it. The flight itself was very quick, only 35 minutes, but was very beautiful and, I imagine, slightly illegal, given that we flew within about 20m of the mountain ranges outside La Paz. I think I could have actually reached out and touched them if I had have been sitting on the wing. After an interesting landing on a grass runway we arrived in the town of Rurrenabaque, a small, hot and humid place which reminded me of coastal Kenya. We checked into Santa Ana which had the following rules:

1. We request not to make noises that cause nuisances to the other ones.
2. To take care of the tackle of the piece.
3. The clients that will leave should vacate the room a.m. otherwise at 12.00 o´clock he/she will run for their bill the night that continues.
4. The visits of the ladies are not allowed to rooms occupied by gentlemen or vice versa.
5. If has some complaints for service or any nature, we request him he/she makes taste like Reception.

We began our Pampas (wetlands) tour the next day. It started with a very squashy, very bumpy ride in a Land Rover over dusty roads. Unfortunately Evans is allergic to dust and I, being next to the window had the fun job of winding up the window everytime a car or truck came past. We couldn´t keep the dust out at all times, however, and after going over a bump a whole cloud of dust came in, giving us all a bath...the driver had to open his door to get it all out. Coincidentally, the first bit of wildlife we did see - a cobra - we ran over. It got stuck in the engine and the driver our guide (Fernando, a half-Mexican, half-Japanese guy who had grown up in Brazil, but has lived in Bolivia for the last 16 years) tried to convince us it was dead, but judging by how quickly they jumped back from the car and slammed the bonnet, I don´t think it was - and it was gone the next time we checked on it. Highlights of the Pampas include:

- Our pet alligator who basically lives at the campsite and is fed by the locals, because he was attacked as a baby by other alligators, who ripped off half his tail, and now can´t fend for himself.
- Beautiful boat trips on which we saw caimen (alligators), three types of monkeys, pink dolphins, hundreds of birds (condors, eagles, falcons, herons), etc.
- Watching the sunset and sunrise from our boat.
- A night time trip in the pitch darkness, except for millions of stars, to spot slowing alligator eyes.
- Fishing for pirañas, despite the fact that only our guide caught any.
- An unsuccessful 2.5 hour trudge through the wetlands in search of an anaconda.
- Great food (seems like that´s all I talk about).
- And the absolute highlight: swimming with the pink dolphins who are very curious and playful, and come up to touch you and try to bite your toes. You can swim with them and not worry about alligators or pirañas, because they stay well clear of the dolphins.
- Back in Rurrenabaque we headed to the Mosquito Bar which did very cheap cocktails - they got a couple of visits out of us. While we were there we met two American girls who were volunteering ath the medical clinic in Rurre. They showed us around the very third-world set-up the next day.

Probably the only lowlight, apart from the car trip, were the mosquitoes: There were millions of them and no amount of repellant could keep them away. For some reason, however, I miraculously escaped without a single bit. The others, however, weren´t so lucky and got absolutely covered in them.

On the way back from Rurrenabaque we decided to get the bus, as everyone we had spoken to said how beautiful the scenery was. The scenery was well worth it, but the time it took - 19 hours (as oppposed to a 35 minute flight. This gives you some indication of how bad Bolivian roads are) was a little bit painful!

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Photos

Rugging up at the bus station
And no, i haven´t put on 400kgs, my bag is in my sleeping bag as well

Comments

[Yvette]

Thought you'd been quite for a while. You have been a very busy girl. The Amazon sunrise is absolutely beautiful and the death road looks terrifying. miss ya....