Heading North
Day 6 (Friday):
We knew the journey from Salta to Bolivia was going to be an interesting one, but good grief. Friday takes the cake for being the absolute worst day so far (and hopefully for the rest of the trip!). Let's start at the top.
We booked a tour with a company that does a loop through little towns north of Salta. We didn't want to head five hours north only to come back to Salta though, so we did half the tour and hopped off in Humahuaca. This half of the day went swimmingly. We left our hostel in Salta at 7:30am, stopped in Purmamarca and... a park whose name I don't remember, and then to Humahuaca! Pretty views of mountains and valleys, cool artisan fairs--we even saw our first llama! (Oh, and we had chicken-fried llama for lunch, and it was delicious). We caught a bus from Humahuaca to La Quiaca, the border town on the Argentine side (you can't buy any trips straight into Bolivia).
We arrived in La Quiaca around 6:30pm, and here's where the fun begins. I'm just going to give you a bullet point rundown of the first 12 hours in Bolivia so you can understand the insanity. Keep in mind that this is all occurring accompanied with splitting altitude-induced headaches. Yay.
- Man at Bolivian customs won't take hardly any of our dollars to pay for visas, because they have minor minor tears on the edges (sorry our money is made of PAPER). Commence going through large amounts of cash in public which makes me all sorts of nervous. Miraculously, we have enough pristine bills and are allowed through.
- Walk a mile ish to Villazón (Bolivian side of the border), pass both a marching band and a large recorder recital. Doesn't help with the headaches.
- Purchase the last seats on the last bus out of town. There are no straight trips to Uyuni (where we wanted to go), but don't worry, says the lady, you just change buses in Potosí.
- Before getting on the bus, I look for a bathroom. You must pay to enter, and there are neither toilet seats nor toilet paper. There is a sign that read "Por favor, eche agua." ... Throw water? I think. Where? Why? Turns out many toilets in Bolivia don't flush, and there are large drums of water in the bathroom with milk jugs in them. After using the loo, you must rinse the toilet with a few jugs of water. It is just as messy and gross as it sounds. Bienvenidos a Bolivia, I think.
- We arrive right on time for our bus at 8pm. ...and then sit at the cold bus terminal for two hours until the bus arrives. At this point I start wondering if I will ever make it back to America.
- If you look at a map, you will see that the ride from Villazón to Potosí is entirely through the mountains. So imagine seven hours on a bus with no heating and windows that don't close completely (and thus rattle incessantly and let the wind in) through bumpy mountain roads. Also, the driver blared his music for the first three hours. Sydney and I were wrapped like burritos with the thin fleece blankets we'd stolen off another bus, with hats gloves and all but still froze through to the bone. Most miserable ride of my entire life.
- We arrive in Potosí at 5am, sore, exhausted, and dazed. Ask the driver about the other bus... he says oh yes go inside the terminal and ask the company office. We do, to find that the office is closed and will not open for three hours. The terminal is colder than a tomb. We're pretty sure we got gypped.
- Sydney and I cry uncle, decide Bolivia is not for us and that we didn't need to see the salt flats in Uyuni that much anyway. We find a map of hostels/hotels and a taxi driver who drives us into town and waits while we Mary-and-Joseph style knock on doors asking if there is any room in the inn. We find a hotel that promises us heating, wifi, and hot showers, and collapse on the bed around 6:30am--just as the sun is rising--with moans of "I hate Bolivia." And thus concludes the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
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| Purmamarca, Argentina |
Potosí
Day 7 (Saturday):
It's amazing what a hot shower, some good iced tea, and pretty views can do to one's mood, and by Saturday afternoon we were feeling a bit less hatred towards Bolivia. After waking up around noon, priority number one was ensuring bus tickets out of town, so we headed to the bus terminal. We wandered around the central area of Potosí, visited the plaza, and stumbled across a good place to eat lunch. Potosí is built into the hills and has some killer views. It has skinny windy streets lined with two story buildings, and everything looked covered in a layer of dust. It is not a tourist town in the slightest--we counted only two other people who looked North American/European! We've also taken to not-so-fondly referring to Potosí as Potonó.
We headed out from Potosí around 9pm--overjoyed to be on a bus with heating and comfy seats!
Side note: One thing I didn't expect about Bolivia (as strange as it may sound) is that it would be so incredibly Bolivian! Just as foreigners expect all Texans to wear hats and ride horses, I expected that the image I had in my mind of Bolivia was exaggerated. It was not. The people on the streets--the women in particular--look straight off the Discovery Channel. The women seem to have an unspoken uniform: big knee-length layered skirt, tights, sweater or shawl, hair in two long braids, and a satchel made from bright striped cloth on their backs carrying either wares or a baby. Oh and hats. Bolivians love hats. The women wore either wide-brimmed straw hats or these smaller top hat looking things that seemed to defy gravity--how do they stay on??
La Paz
Day 8 (Sunday):
We arrived in La Paz at dark-thirty, and had to nap on the floor of the hostel until our rooms were ready. The hostel in La Paz was CRAZY! It held at least 200 people and was beautifully furnished--chandeliers, gold furnishings, huge mirrors, tiled floors. It had a fully equipped bar and to my knowledge threw themed parties every night.
Sunday was our La Paz tour day, so we wandered around different parts of town until it got dark. We visited a few plazas and saw some pretty churches. We also went to a huge cemetery on the far side of town, which made us get out of the touristy section and into the real La Paz. The streets of La Paz are... busy. There are women sitting on blankets lining both sides of the streets selling more fruits, nuts, spices, vegetables, and baked goods than you can imagine--some of the foods I'd never seen before in my life! There were also piles of fish just laying out in the sun--doesn't quite seem healthy to me! The bus system in La Paz is really more of small 9-15 passenger vans with their destinations on posters in the front window. Some of them even have boys hanging out the side window yelling where they're going and for how much. And I thought the buses in Buenos Aires were difficult! There was a marching band (we saw a marching band every day we were in Bolivia...) adding to the noise and bustle. We also passed through the Witch Market which had, among other things, dead dried baby llamas hanging from their stalls. We walked through there reaaal quick.
On the way home we passed a street show--some comedian talking into a mic to a huge crowd--and we had not stopped for ten seconds before they spotted us and involved us in the show. They asked our names, where we were from (we said Canada, just to be safe), and made good-natured jokes about tourists and gringos. So funny!
As someone who is anemic and thus doesn't have enough oxygen in her blood to begin with, Bolivia was rough on me. And after living at sea level for five months then climbing 12,000 ft, I felt all kinds of bad by the time we got to La Paz. (I actually started giving my heart encouraging pep-talks.) I went to bed early and slept for 12 hours that night!
Day 9 (Monday):
The strawberry French toast and smoothies we had for breakfast were hands-down the best meal so far (good breakfast food is hard to come by!). A guy in the hostel had told us about a café a few blocks away, and the breakfast on Monday marked meal number three at Alexander's Coffee. Yes. We went to La Paz and ate at the same not-Bolivian restaurant for every single meal. I'm gonna blame it on the al-al-al-al-al-altitude (sickness).
After breakfast we wandered over to a park that supposedly had good views, and it did not disappoint. La Paz is nestled in a valley, meaning anywhere you turn the city continues up into the mountains around you. When we left La Paz we drove up into the mountains, and the view looking down on the entire city was indescribable--with the snow-capped peaks providing a backdrop. La Paz is stunning from a distance, but up close and personal... honestly it just reminded me of an area in Buenos Aires called Once--an uglier part of town that you try to avoid if at all possible.
We decided that we should visit Lake Titicaca (the highest lake in the world, situated between Bolivia and Peru) while we were so close, so we hopped on a bus Monday afternoon for Copacabana. The trip took about four hours and involved a ferry ride across a straight, and we arrived in the tiny little lakeshore town just before sunset. The rolly walk of shame is even more shameful uphill, but we finally arrived to our hotel, winded but there. We had a romantic candlelit pizza dinner in a local restaurant and turned in early.
Copacabana
Day 10 (Tuesday):
We got up bright and early for the boat ride across the lake to la Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun). We sat atop the boat for the two hour ride and my, what a view! I could not believe how blue the water was, and the surrounding islands were so pretty. We were surrounded by Brazilians, Germans, and Frenchmen on the boat (I'm not sure why but there are a TON of French people in Bolivia...), so for the two hour ride we did one of our favorite things and didn't speak English. Sydney and I both happen to know "Ubby Dubby", a silly made-up language kinda like Pig Latin that merely mixes up English but is quite difficult to understand. We often prefer to speak that, with the occasionally Spanish thrown in, solely to confuse people. Have to amuse yourself somehow, right?
Once on the island we followed a hiking trail around its north side. There were sheep, baby sheep, pigs, baby pigs, and burros. And the panoramic views were never ending! We spent most the afternoon in the sun (and I have a pink face now to prove it), and then had lunch with two Chilean guys we'd met on the bus from La Paz. And by had lunch with I mean sat there while they ate lunch because we had one (1) boliviano to our name (approximately 15 cents). We made it back to Copacabana with enough time to send a few messages to the fam, then head for the bus station again!
I am currently writing this from the last (LAST!!) overnight bus ride of the trip! We're headed to Cusco, and should make it into town before the sun rises. We gave Bolivia an enthusiastic goodbye at the border--I'm sure Bolivia is a lovely place but by our experience we just were not won over. We are beyond excited though, because we're staying in Cusco for five straight nights. FIVE NIGHTS! The longest we've stay somewhere so far has been two!
Fun fact 1: As of an hour ago, I have officially been to fourteen countries. A-WHOOP!
Fun fact 2: One week from tonight I'll be getting on a plane to the good ol' US of A! No puedo creerlo!!
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