La Paz (meaning "peace") is set in a huge valley and as we rode down into it we stopped and got a beautiful view of the city nestled in between the mountains. It looked so peaceful from up there. That was to change...

We pulled into the streets of the city on our bus, realising that there were no rules here. Central and South America doesn't have too many forceable road rules so we are kind of used to it. Although this is so, La Paz succeeded in scaring us a lot more than all the others. Leaving the peace of Lake Titicaka we collided with the cogested, crazy traffic, a constant roar of car horns and pedestrians who are the most idiotic we've ever seen. They would walk across the streets with not a care in the world almost being hit 5 times before successfully making it to the other side. The city was full of life and just put you on edge.

We dropped off the others on our tour at their hotels, noticing the run down look of them all and worrying for our own. We should never have doubted though, as we were located by the only park in the city away from a lot of the congested craziness and were welcomed into a nice lobby.

Starting to come down ill, Kate called an early night while Steve, Charm and myself enjoyed a nice room-service dinner. The next day we spent in the hotel relaxing and just plain old doing nothing. It was great to just relax after being on the move for the past week. I was able to get free use of a new gym which highlighted my day! Kate still feeling unwell (possibly altitude sickness?) also enjoyed the relax day.

Our 2nd and last day in La Paz we headed out into the craziness and headed for some markets to check out. A little b*****ed and light headed after walking into the main area and struggling with the altitude, we decided on a short break in a restaurant. Kate had braved her sick body up until this point but couldn't handle it any longer. So we decided to leave Steve and Charm to wander the streets and the markets themselves while we returned to the hotel so Kate could recover. We did head out for dinner that night but apart from mentioning the streets were twice as crazy as before sunset, it was just a nice dinner spent in good company.

We were happy to pack our bags (you wont here that line very often!) to depart La Paz. We were heading to the airport to catch a flight from the highest international airport in the world back to Lima, Peru. I don't know if we just had a different experience in La Paz or if Kate being unwell played a role, but it's definately not a city we will rave about. Kate and I will probably pass through here again on this trip so we can give it a second chance perhaps. It may sound negative but we absolutely loved just chilling out after a crazy week before this and lived it up in our beautiful hotel.