The easiest and most beautiful way to cross from Peru to Bolivia is via Lake Titicaca, the highest navigational lake in the world. We made our first stop as a party of 6 at Copacabana, a small town on the shore of the vast lake. What stuck us most was the contrast from Peruvian to Bolivian life, it's almost immediate and quite harsh. The houses are more decrepit, there are mountains of rubbish at the side of the road and life in general just appears much harder judging from the weathered and tatty appearance of the locals.

We spent a few days in Copacabana, strolling along the lake shore and trekking on the beautiful remote island of Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun). Due to the altitude (3812m) breathing here is so difficult and we all struggled to walk the 10km loop of the island, we've never moaned so much or felt so unfit!

After we'd exhausted all that Copacabana had to offer (it cannot be compared to Brazil's offering of the same name, unfortunately no scantily clad bodies here), we took the hairy, and at times bizarre, journey to La Paz, capital of Bolivia.

La Paz is a sprawling, hectic mass of development. Thousands of Bolivians have flocked here over recent years in search of riches that never materialise, which unfortunately means there is extreme poverty. On every street corner there are beggars and women selling anything, from neon nail polishes to llama foetuses, with their babies either packaged up on their backs or on the pavement in cardboard boxes, all pretty shocking and heart-wrenching.

James, his dad, sister and her boyfriend, Joe, all braved the 'most dangerous road in the world' on mountain bikes and all returned unscathed, thankfully, although there were tears, copious amounts of swearing and severe frostbite during the first freezing hour of the trip!

Plan A was to fly from La Paz to Sucre in the south of Bolivia, however when the flight was cancelled at the last minute, we reverted to plan B, good old fashioned land transport, a 10 hour night bus, a doddle for us but an all new experience for others in the party!The bus was pretty comfy and we kicked back and relaxed, quite relieved to be leaving behind the chaos of La Paz. An hour in the journey took a nasty turn when we realised one of our bags had been stolen, passports, money, flight tickets, camera, you name it, it was in there. We were distraught, more for letting our guard down in arguably the most under-developed country in South America.Lesson learnt the hard way.

After having to bribe the reluctant, hostile and lazy police for a report, we continued on to Sucre and Potosi.We visited a number of museums before venturing into the silver/tin mines and being horrified at the working conditions of the miners.It's unbelievable that in the 21st century mining like this still goes on, an archaic system of picks, shovels, dynamite and hand pushed carts still operates in Potosi.Miners are forced to chew coca leaves and sip on 95% alcohol just to get them through their working day (20-40 hours), all very disturbing.

Two days later we returned to La Paz, this time with all of our belongings intact.After 10 days, one robbery, no major arguments and a few tears it was time for James' family to leave.Having them here has been amazing, after almost 5 months on the road we've missed familiar faces and friendly banter.Their help and support during the recent testing times was brilliant, the thieves couldn't have timed it better!

We're sad to say we're writing this from La Paz, having just received our temporary passports. During the past week we've visited almost every museum, witnessed a historic football match (Bolvia 6-1 Argentina) and frequented every decent bar in the city.Next we head to the south of the country before heading into Chile…guaranteed we won't shed a tear when leaving Bolivia behind.