Hola!

I think the last time I did a blog we were in Puno, so I´ll continue from there.

The morning after the last blog we went on a trip to Lake Titicaca and visited some of the islands on the lake. We had lunch on a really nice Island called Tequille, then moved on to Amanti island, where we were all shipped to peoples homes to stay the night. We shared a place with Tim and Lana, and we actually got a really nice house. It was about the only one with electricity! Before getting to the island we had bought gifts for the family. We got them rice, pasta, jam, candles and stuff for the kids to draw with. It´s best to get them stuff they can use. We were cooked a really nice meal and then went to the local hall so we could all dress up in typical Peruvian clothes and dance about and have a few drinks. This was great fun.

Next morning after a very filling breakfast, we got back on the boat and headed to the Uros islands, which are a group of Islands on the lake made entirely of reeds. It felt wierd at first, but you got used to it. We were shown how the reeds are used for making stuff and eating, and we got another shot at dressing up. They even had a little Guinea Pig farm on the island! We got a little trip in a boat made of reeds then we headed back to Puno.

When we arrived in Puno we were told we had to leave within the hour as there was to be a strike at the Bolivian border the next day, so we may never get through for a week. Turns out it was all rubbish, but we made it to La Paz late that night. La Paz is built into a giant basin shaped area, and at night it looks amazing. It´s also pretty bad for thieves, so we had to be careful all the time. Our driver Alex reckons we were the first group not to have anything stolen while unloading the truck.

We didn´t do much in La Paz other than a city tour. This took us to the Witches Market, where people sell Lamas foetus´ to put under your house for good luck. They also sell bloated frogs for good luck in the money department. The market was pretty much like any other apart from these few things. We also visited a place called Moon Valley, so called because Neil Armstrong played golf in La Paz in the 70´s and thought it looked just like the moon.

Some people did a bike tour of Death Road/Valley, which is the most dangerous road in the world. It goes from 4500m to 100m in the space of 60km! Didn´t have the cash, so we gave it a miss. One night we had a Pimps N´ Prozzies party. We first had a meal at the appartment we were staying at. Merle and I never dressed up as it looked a bit too much to spend on stuff we´d never use again. Some of the people looked amazing! I´ll try get some photo´s to give you an idea. We bought a bottle of vodka for the night, and it was only 66p!

Now we are in Potosi, the highest up city in the world (bad english, but I´m struggling to think of a better way to put it!), standing at 4070m above sea level. We´ve been here one night, and this morning we did a tour to the local mines. We bought presents for the miners, and we got to buy dynamite to blow something up too. We got a massive watermelon to blow up. It was awesome. WE didn´t expect such a big bang, so it was really cool. There were no traces of the watermelon to be seen afterwards. The mine tour itself took about 2 hours, and we were crawling through small gaps in our miners outfit. We got to see the miners working and gave them chocolate, drinks and cigarettes as a gift. It was really eye opening, as we thought it was OK for a tour, but to work 12-15 hour days from the age of 12 would be really hard.

And that´s the end of things up til now. I´ll try get my photo´s up, but it may take some time, as decent computers here are few and far between.

Adios Amigos.