The journey to La Paz and back again.....

"At the Copa - Copacabana ......."

Our first stop after Peru and the main jumping off point for the Lake Titicaca highlight of Isla Del Sol.
The guidebooks describe Copacabana as a pleasant, quaint lake-side town famous as a pilgrimage destination for Catholics country-wide to pay homage to the famous Virgen de Copacabana situated within the imposing walls of the local Moorish Cathedral.

Imagine my disappointment then, when we happened upon what was essentially Leigh-on-Sea, replete with pedalos and local crazy person, except the chavs had been replaced by tie-dye bohos and the kids in the arcades by sad looking boys strumming what look like toy guitars with one irritating song in their repertoire. (I gave them 3 Peruvian Soles that I didn't need anymore just to go away.) And there wasn't even any Crazy Golf....

We found a cheap hostel with a weird cranky old guy at the front desk who looked like he'd just stepped out of "The Shining". The one redeeming feature of this place was the nice view across the lake - for all else it may as well have been a squatters drug den.
Our time in Copa was spent drinking crap coffee, eating crap food, receiving crap service, getting sunburnt, and getting a crap nights sleep.

HOWEVER, Isla Del Sol is beautiful. The dazzling beauty of the Lake and the Island provide ample distraction from the painfully SLOW journey and the fact that there is no tour guide or any organisation whatsoever.
We figure out the path to follow and wend our way through tiny Aymara villages, fascinating rocky paths with stunning views and landscapes until we reach the labyrinthine religious site at the north end of the island, revered as the place where the creator god Viracocha created the sun and moon and thus gave birth to the Inca dynasty.

Due to an impossible time schedule and intense heat, we decide to walk back the way we came rather than attempt the 3 hour trek through the rest of the island. A recurring niggle of our travels so far is the South Americans almost "Ryan Air" approach to incremental sales. Nothing is ever the price they say it is. You pay for one thing, but that is never the end of it. This was highlighted spectacularly during this trip when after paying for the tour at the office in Copa, then paying "entry" to the Inca ruins, we got back on the boat to stop further down the island for lunch when the enterprising locals demanded an extra 10bobs to get off the boat! I'd already paid to get to the island and visit a part of it! And the lunch wasn't even free!

Back at Copa, after more crap coffee accompanied by yet more crap service, followed by a dubious faff concerning our bus "tickets" - we boarded the dodgiest looking bus for our journey to La Paz.
This bus looked like a reject from a 1970's school run that had been left to rot and rust until one enterprising Bolivian decided he could make a quick buck with this wreckage. There followed quite possibly the longest 3 ½ hrs of my life sat on the most uncomfortable seat I've ever had the misfortune to sit on. Not only was my butt constantly spiked by the several loose springs lurking in what was left of the foam in the seat, but the window next to us insisted on rattling itself open with every jolt the bus made letting in the freezing cold night air. These irritations paled in comparison to the smelly, annoying, fidgety, loud family next to us with the child who insisted on balancing himself in the middle of the aisle in such a fashion that every time the bus lurched round a sharp corner the brat tumbled into my lap!

"Bright Lights, Big City..."

Having read all about the various scams and dangers in La Paz just waiting to ruin your travelling experience, we were understandably cautious upon arrival and were careful to choose a safe and reputable looking taxi. I was confident of my choice up to the point where he turned down a dark alley that looked like a prime spot for tourist "disappearances" and "accidents"..... Just as I was about to grab hold of Katy and make a bold leap from the moving vehicle, the driver stopped the car and announced our arrival at our hostel. Regaining some self dignity with positive noises like "Ahem, yeah, well, I knew that..." and making sure I didn't look like the nervous wreck that I felt, we checked in. The next morning revealed a reassuring lane of fabric shops and more hostels, not the alleyway of danger and mishap that I had envisaged the previous night....

La Paz is an assault on the senses - your breath is taken away not only by the altitude but by this visually stunning, cosmopolitan and compact city that is ablaze with vibrant colour and energy. Surrounded by enormous mountains, with the red brick buildings of the city's poorer inhabitants clinging to the steep slopes, the streets are teeming with market stalls and street vendors selling anything from oranges to batteries to artisan crafts to DVDs.

One charming street in particular is home to the famous "witches market". Located just off the steep slope of Sagarnaga (or "Gringo Alley" as it's known amongst locals) this cobbled street is lined with cafes, hostels and shops stuffed with artisan crafts, yet every so often your eye is caught by a dark interior selling what at first glance look like innocent jars of boiled sweets, of the kind that you might find in an old fashioned sweet shop, yet upon closer inspection, between these jars, the shelves are crammed with totems and idols, small charms, bottles of intriguing looking liquids stuffed with local herbs and....llama foetuses. Racks upon racks of these shrivelled, dried, skeletons grin manically down at you with their dead eyes. Apparently, the superstitious locals bury these under the porches or doorsteps of a new home to bring good fortune. We purchased a modest sized idol from a wizened old woman (disappointingly, sans pointy hat...) that was suspiciously light, but is supposed to be good for something or other.

Tourists nervously bumble along whilst balaclava'd shoe shine boys hustle for business and colourful local women with the ubiquitous bowler hat perched high on their heads fight their way through the throngs to go about their day. All the while, with a caller hanging precariously from the door frame yelling their next destinations at the top of their voice, the big old American school bus style micros and the smaller combis beep at, and narrowly avoid, the pedestrians milling through the nose to tail traffic. Yet somehow all this seems more amenable and more manageable than Lima or even Cusco, possibly because very little of the activity seems to be specifically directed at the tourists. Sure if they catch you eyeing their wares they spring into sales mode, but for the most part you can walk down the street without people thrusting things in your face or demanding you look at their tours. Our first evening is spent "treating ourselves" to an awesome steak dinner at the imaginatively titled "The Steak House", followed by witnessing some extraordinary Spanish style guitar playing at "Sol Y Luna" bar.

La Paz, it soon becomes apparent, knows how to party. Our second night in the city is filled with the noise of revellers from the streets below which soon makes way for a concert playing the worst "music" I've been subjected to since our arrival on this continent. And best of all, it sounds like it's coming from right outside our window. And it goes on for AGES..... unlike the conservative approach we have at home to outdoor live music gigs (i.e. sound levels, nearby residential area, please leave quietly signs etc), this concert went on till 3am in the morning and when we got up at 5 the next morning the streets were still full of staggering pissed Bolivians.

"I Want Ride My Bicycle..."

So after b*****-all sleep it's time for one of the anticipated highlights of our trip to Bolivia (for me anyway - it's only taken 3 weeks of constantly talking about it for Katy to come round to the idea....) The old road linking La Paz to Coroico has the rather ominous sounding nick name "Death Road" aka "The Worlds Most Dangerous Road" aka "El Camino Del Muerte" aka........ well, you get the idea. It's supposed to be an adrenaline junkie, mountain biking fanatics wet dream. I thought we'd fit right in....

As is usual for Bolivia, everything was running late - but we were still the first group to the starting point. After a brief, er, briefing, and being strapped up and uniformed in black with orange vests, so that we looked like a bunch of kamikaze, yet safety-aware cycling ninjas, we were freewheeling at speed down the tarmac'd section of the new road till we reach the checkpoint to pay the entry fee for the dubious privilege of riding on the "death" part of the old road. This is where the fun starts....

"...a rough, narrow track chiselled out of near vertical mountainsides that descends more than 3500m over a distance of just 64km; dozens of vehicles tumbled off it's edges every year, with fatalities often reaching the hundreds." (The Rough Guide To South America on a budget)

Our guide had given us all sorts of handy advice at the start of this section, like "keep to the LEFT side of the road. The CLIFF side" Yes, that's right - the bit with the sheer drop.
The road is INCREDIBLY rough, bumpy and narrow with huge steep drops on the left side. The route has way more beautiful scenery than I expected, however there is little opportunity to appreciate the views as any loss of concentration could result in an unplanned departure over the edge maaaaaaannnnn!!!! Our group suffered 3 separate minor slips as we descended, which only served as a reminder to the rest of us how focused this road demands you to be. The route is dangerous, but great fun. Bumpy, juddery, bone shaking - thank God for our dual shock suspension.... I amused myself by letting out a low "ahhhhh" which sounded like "ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah" as I was bumped along by the uneven surface and large stones protruding from the road. Many times I was reminded of my racing days at Harleston BMX track or mountain biking rough terrain over the thick dried mud of Farmer-something-or-other's fields and the lessons those bike rides of my youth afforded me - Zen-like, I was at one with the road.......(in my head). Katy, meanwhile, who had been so nervous since this trip was first mentioned, was BOMBING down the road seemingly without a care in the world. At one point I had to race to catch up!
"Death Road"?? Done!

"Welcome To The Jungle, We Got Fun And Games..."

Alarm off at 4am - sweet. We take a taxi to La Paz airport to board what looks like a toy plane. The TINY aircraft somehow manages not to be crushed by upper air currents/other planes/condors and lands in the middle of a local farmers' field. It turns out that this is Rurrenabaque "airport". Complete with horses.

Our pre-tour breakfast in "Rurre" was disturbed by begging street kids and torrential rain. I feel sad for both them and us and hope this doesn't continue. Everything is late again. Two hours that we'll never get back again were spent travelling along THE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE RD IN THE WORLD*.

(4x4) Jeep + grumpy driver + bumpy pot-holed gravel dirt track + uncomfortable seats - fun for the first 10 mins = just painful and annoying.

The local tour agencies seem content to be constantly disorganised and late, which I find constantly frustrating. So again we're left waiting ages for anyone to arrive to let us know what's going on. Finally a "tour guide" arrives and we eventually set off down the Yacuma river. My dull mood and general scepticism for the tour soon disappear as almost straight away we see wildlife - then it moves, yes its real! Hundreds of alligators and caimans, lots of turtles, storks, herons, capybara, a glimpse of a pink dolphin, some playful spider monkeys, jumping fish and loads of other things that I have no idea what they were, all either lined up by the river banks feeding/cooling off/just hanging out or swimming by the boat.

(*If I have mentioned "the most uncomfortable road in the world" in a previous blog entry then that was luxury in comparison....)

Our company, Indigena tours, proudly declare their environmentally friendly intentions and display those credentials in their offices and at the lodge. It is a well known fact before you embark on these tours that touching or interfering with the wildlife can have a damaging effect on the eco-systems that they inhabit. With this in mind, I was nervous about the tour for the simple reason that should the situation arise where I was expected to partake in any such activities I did not want to cause a scene by refusing to do so.

On the second day our guides led us off anaconda hunting. It all started pleasantly enough, walking through long grass and then fields with strange looking white cows beneath clear blue skies, observing large birds of prey until we reached the wet pampas. Our guide explained that we will soon see the anacondas. Katy looked nervous, I was dubious. The search involved the guide frantically beating through any potential nesting areas in the shallow lily filled waters with his stick as if trying to entice them out? This went on for some time, wading through one area of wet, marshy land to another, all the while the guide wandering off to explore and wave his stick around a patch that could contain a snake of some description.
After a couple of hours in the scorching heat spent heaving our weary legs through dense areas of swampy, boggy, mosquito infested marshland and patches of long grass, with no sighting of any serpentine creatures, our guide declared that another guide leading the other group from our lodge had "miraculously" found the elusive anaconda. At this point, said guide was approximately half an hours walk away on the other side of the lake that we'd just walked around and through and he was going to BRING the damn thing all the way round to us! Now, by this point I was bit tired and fed up, Katy was flagging in the heat and I had already made up my mind that I was not going to be part of any animal bothering. So with typical Finch tact and grace I politely told our guide that there was no way that I was going to wait knee high in mosquito infested bog-land whilst his mate brought round the wretched creature. This resulted in the rest of our group making the arduous journey round the other side of the lake to meet the guide halfway and ogle at the anaconda whilst Katy and I were led back to the lodge. Now anyone who knows me will verify that I am not exactly known for my eco-warrior, wildlife loving stance in life. I do, however, like to think that I have ethics and morals....

After lunch the tense situation was alleviated somewhat by heading out in the boat to enjoy a spot of fishing. I've always found fishing to be the most inane and intensely DULL past-time I've ever been exposed to, but the prospect of fishing for REAL LIVE PIRANHAS in the Amazon basin certainly spiked my interest. So there we all are, standing up in a boat no more than 2 metres across, dangling our pathetic plastic lines with morsels of meat attached to the hooks in piranha infested waters. And when they started to bite we kept reeling them in - the boat rocking precariously back and forth from the excited cries of whoever had caught one of the little blighters as they came up flapping from the water gnashing their rows of razor sharp teeth at the hooks tangled in their mouths (or in some cases through their eye sockets!) and flopping onto the floor of the boat.

So after a few piranhas and a couple of sardines had made their way onto each of our hooks, had their photographs taken and been put back into the water again, we headed back to base for a pleasant evening of football, dinner, wine and card games.

Day 3 began with an early start to watch the sunrise over the pampas. The boat ride was met with freaky, strange twilight animal noises that were put to shame by a group of howler monkeys that make the WIERDEST noises. Like a cross between a gurgling drain or when the last of the water is draining from your bath down the plug-hole and a stomach grumbling when you're really hungry.
After breakfast we had the opportunity of swimming with the pink dolphins that inhabit the river. Bearing in mind that the river is infested with alligators and caiman, I'm a big jessy and Katy earns MASSIVE kudos for jumping in the murky waters to partake in this frankly insane activity. The pink dolphin was elusive yet made fleeting appearances very near to the 5 bodies nervously treading water whilst alligators eyed them hungrily from the nearby riverbank.

Another long delay awaited us for our ride back to Rurrenabaque. Faced with the same grumpy driver along the same terrible road EXCEPT THIS TIME the damn jeep keeps breaking down! What a nightmare journey. The jeep had to stop several times whilst clouds of steam poured from the engine.
One un-nerving stop was made at some rusty shacks with a few people sitting down playing cards, eating something indeterminate. Dogs that looked like they hadn't eaten in months vied for our attention - I tried not to look at their ribs pressing through their thin fur. From out of nowhere a grey thin stubbly-skinned pig appears and starts grunting around the dry ground for scraps. It has a face like one of the demons from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. A small child plays nearby with a hammer and beats anything that is stationary for more than 5 minutes. The ants teeming around beneath my feet ensure that I do not meet an untimely demise at the hands of this Latin American version of Damian. I'm glad when the jeep finally revs up and we get out of there. Deliverance country indeed.

After several more stops involving scorching heat, torrential rain and the onset of nightfall, we get rescued by a taxi to take us the rest of the way back. A 2 hour painful journey has turned into a 5 ½ hour epic. Amusingly, upon our return to the Indigena offices, we are asked to complete a response form. I manage to keep the Finch tact and grace in check as I carefully construct my comments.....

Deano x
La Paz 24/07/11