We arrived in Sucre in darkness, the bus stopped in an anonymous street and the conductor invited us all onto the street with the word "Sucre". He emphasised it being the end of the ride by emptying all the rucksacks onto the street - We had arrived but where?

An old lady pulled at my sleeve saying "Taksee" without any other option the three of us climbed into the cab, instructing the driver to take us to "Café Berlin". Bizarrely the woman climbed in beside the driver and we spent an uneasy 15 minutes driving through the backstreets of Sucre. The driver stopped in a dimly lit street outside a building flying the German Flag and drove off a little too quickly, once he had been paid. We looked around us on the street and in the half- light spotted a man lighting a cigarette; he turned away as we met his gaze. We knocked on the large gothic door, which was opened after a few minutes; the man looked quizzically at us …. "The night before Christmas" Dan said - it was the password we had been given. "It's the door code" the man replied pointing to a keypad we had missed "2412". We were assigned rooms and our room was a little bizarre having a double bed 8 feet off the ground and requiring the climbing of wall-bars to access it.

The hostel was a shared facility with the German institute and seeing several people in classrooms learning German and Spanish made it feel like a Spy school in a cold war movie - We even felt like wartime radio operators as we unpacked our computer to call home.

The café attached to the hostel had pictures of Marlene Dietrich and of Liza Minnelli in her Cabaret role. The owner was called Klaus, a genial German and the mysterious man who lived in the "house" built on the roof was purported to be the previous owner but he was never seen.

As we settled into the hostel, we found it had a good international mix of people, who were very friendly - Andrew & Caroline from Scotland, Kat from the UK, Leticia from Australia, Kath from Australia and of course Jo who had arrived with us. - There were many more but this was the nucleus of the hostel group.

Sucre grew on you, it sucked you in, we spoke to people who were just "passing through" and had stayed for three months. So it was with us, our planned three day stopover ended up being ten days. Dan and Jo took Spanish lessons (Dan only for a week) whilst Heather wandered the markets and explored the town (and tested the students on their verbs in the afternoon). The town had no "big ticket" tourist attractions but it was a nice City (the judicial capital of Bolivia) the company was good, the food was good ….. It weaved a spell.

They showed the European Champions Final between Dortmund and Bayern Munich and in a German Hostel/Institute ….. Packed to the rafters and the atmosphere was electric, even for a neutral it was very exciting and German beer goes well with adrenalin. Eventually, we broke the spell and after 10 great days, we headed for the airport and La Paz.