26-10-10

So woke up bright and early this morning to drag myself onto the bus to La Paz where we will be crossing the border of Peru and Bolivia. Peru has been awesome, definatly want to come back, kind of a romantic place to the south also, bbring a loved one people!!

The bus to La Paz was actually ok, although it was probably good to the fact that i was in an alcohol induced coma for most of it from the night before. Had to wake up to d customs, where we had to go to 3 seperate buildings.....all 3 had people with guns in them!! As soon as we crossed the boarder you could see quite a difference. Especially when we got to La Paz. La Paz is ver big, busy as hell, bit like London but hotter, slightly bigger, but with better food, and sexier accents! Very tall buildings and lots of noise, hotel was nice although was on the 4th floor and as mentioned before we are all very sick of steps!!! We arrived quite late today, so we arranged to go for food and spend out last night with a few people and our guide Alim. Taxi to the an asian restaurant, was very interesting as the traffic was so thick, there are lines in the road for 2 cars, but somehow they manage to fit a bus, 2 motorbikes, and 3 cars in that space!!! Quite impressive really, its definately a skill. Had my first curry in a long time which was very nice, and also got excited......due to the change country that now means....change of different beers to try!!! So far not as good as Peru, but am open minded and will judge at the end. Was a relatively quiet night, as everyone was suffering from the night before, although did go to a bar for a few to say goodbyes, it reminded me of Barfly in Cardiff, was like dungeon esq, but didn´t stick of piss!!

27-10-10

Well today was one of our best days so far. We had arranged to go Mountain Biking down a road called ´Death Road´, google it for more histrory but basically alot of people have died on it, due to it being 4500m above sea level and you finish at 1400m and its all down hill, with one side a of the road a big drop down!!! Was amazing, best value for money, we all done really well, was an extreme experience that i loved, they also took loads of photos and videos for us. What made it even better is when we finished (2pm - ish), one of the guides ´Jelo´came out of the van with ice cold beers (its was swealtering hot), which made everyones days. I also soon realised that white shorts was not a good idea, as i also now looked like i´d had a big accident! Bt it was just the mud....honeslty! AFter this they took us to a outdoor pool for more beers, swimming and food, relaxed by the pool etc. We soon realised that the guides were also interested in getting jolly, when they had bought loads of cuba libre..expecially Omar (see pictures). The bus ride home was 2 hours and it was an alcohol fueled doss about, which most of us see mainly as a blur afterwards....we blame the guide Omar. We stopped half way to buy another can of cuba libre, then he came back on with a 2 litre bottle of the stuff....all down hill from there!!

We got back and due to meet our new guide that night, turns out he´s from Bristol, but has lived in Buenos Aires for 18 months after travelling for 19 months in South America. I´ll be honest i don´t remember much of that night, one of us didn´t even make it to our meal that night, after spanking our new guide then passing out in her bed!! Needless to say we all slept well that night!!

28-10-10

Iwas pretty sure today was an alcohol free day so was looking forward to it. Had a free day to ourselves. We wondered round the shops halloween shopping today, was nice to properly see La Paz in the day, lots of various smells from the markets, mainly the Llama fetus´you can buy as ornaments, stank of well...death....very pretty, was tempted to buy one for halloween but realised people wouldn´t stand near me!! There were also sweet smells of fruit and various other foods. Such a hussle bussle city, very hot, but wicked to just watch people go about there business. Especiall the shoe shiners, who we were told sometimes where balaclavas so they´re family don´t now thats what they do for a job....bit sad really, we were also told not to buy anything of children as it just encourages them not to go to school and get an education, which was fair enough!!

In the afternoon, we had a tour, saw the valley of the moon, called so because Lance Armstrong saw it and said it looks like the moon....i thought that perhaps thats where hollywood got the idea for the moon when they filmed it!!??

That night was quiet went for a ´supposed´mexican, but my enchaladas resembled lasagne slush, and not spicy. Apparently Bolivians don´t know what spicy is, which i have noticed, so ask for everything as hot as they can get it now!!!

29-10-10

First bus in Bolivia today to look forward to, heading to La Paz. The buses here don´t have toilets, so on a 7 hour journey they stop once for loo break.....or apparently if people are that busy, they´ll just pee on the bus..........hence quick swap from sandels to trainers! Luckily enough no one pissed on the bus...success!! Although i did get to witness some large women (bare in mind its probably about 28 degress on the bus), recline her seat all the way back (resembling a beached whale), then cover herself in about 5 blankets, me and my friend couldn´t believe it as we´d been having window wars with the person in front all the way..we did laugh quite a bit though when this lady attempted getting out of her seat....basically she couldn´t!! Call me a git, but if you were there, you would´ve laughed too....trust me!

So Ochabamba.....big , busy, hotel resembled ´´phsyco´, but my main fear was being killed by the amount of mosquitos we had in the bathroom, pretty sure we had the smallest room, no windows (bit of a theme in Bolivia), with bars on the window...lovely.

30-10-10

Not much to do today, we were told to go have a look at something called él christo´, big catholic icon thing, went along mainly for the view. Walked through a very busy market on the way, bought loads of fruit, chopped it all up and basically made me a fruit salad...screw bear grills!!! The market place was amazing, so many colours, smells, people, proper busy place!!

Got to the view point was pretty cool, as anyone who knows me knows, i don´t really give a rats arse about religion, so wasn´t to bothered about the statue, but the view was wicked!

Tonight was a night bus for 10 hours to Sucre, the capital. The bus station resembled a scene from 28 weeks later when the virus hits again an everyone is just running blind in a mad panic. But with people shouting place names at you. Theres like 40 different bus companies all vieing for your business so you have loads of people shouting at you "La Paz, La Paz, LA PAZ"...."I DONT WANT TO GO TO F-ING LA PAZ"...."Cochabamba, Cochabamba.....god was irritating. The bus itself was an appitamy of comfort..ha...my seat luckily enough didn´t recline as the handle had snapped, our guide had some sleeping pills though as i could´t sleep at all due to uncomfortable, but then took that and was out like a light, in a nice sitting up right, head leaning forward position,...bliss, cant wait to see how my back feels tomorrow!

31-10-10

After popping my spine back to its normal position, we got to sucre, very quiet for a capital, but is very pretty, completely different from La Paz!! SPent the mornin wandering around the shops etc, then in the afternoon we had arranged to visit an Orphange. We bought masks and took our halloween costumes, they were aged 0-5 years old, was very sweat and the place itself was very clean and not as bad as i imagined. The children were amazing, the babies, loving our cameras, the toddlers loving our capes and mucking around with us, was brilliant fun, got a bit emitonal when one 8 monther was falling asleep in my arms and then when i was trying to put him to bed he would cry his name was Marques (see photo).

So that night then we had Halloween planned, there were about 5 other GAP groups in sucre tonight, but we were the only ones dressed up!!! Can´t beleive how much they suck! Had a fantastic night, dancing like idiots and generally making ass´s of ourselves (the usual for me). One more day in Sucre before going to Potosi and seeing the salt flats, think i´m halfway through my south America trp now, going so quickly!!! Loving every minute!!