From Blue Beer in La Paz to the Blue Waters of Lago Titicaca

11 days ago Carly landed! And since then the three of us have hit the road again, leaving behind our Santa Cruz kids (with a massive cream cake and lots of new toys) and have so far made our way back to La Paz, to Lake Titicaca and the Isla Del Sol and onward to Sucre where we are resting now, with a few layers peeled off, in the sun. Here's the tale of the last 11 days...

We spent our last 2 days at Alalay with Lar and the two days involved pizza for breakfast, trying to disarm the kids of a kitten that they found on the way to school and thought it was just the right size for their backpacks, a huge cream cake, lots of dancing and playing with a few new toys that we found for them. It was a lovely couple of days, as manic as always but as happy as saying goodybe can get. 11 days later and we are still talking about them....

Anyways, from there we went straight to La Paz (a 16hour bus ride with no toilet - welcome Lar!) and we thought there would be lots of celebrations on again because it was Bolivian Independence Day but there was nothing... I think its celebrated more in smaller regions across Bolivia. So instead we chilled for a few days, showed Lar the city and decided to have some celebrations of our own. We went to the witches market this time where they sell all sorts of lucky charms and these sheets of canvas that have llama feotuses on them along with other good luck charms which you have to burn on an open fire for good luck (I think on special occasions). Me and Lar bought a tiny good luck charm each which you have to bury in the garden of your home for good luck. No houses for me and Wills yet so I'm planning to pass mine on after our travels to give the luck to someone else.

While we were in La Paz we met a couple called Josh and Sylvia who live in Mexico (Sylvia is Mexican) who told us there was a reggae festival on in the woods that night so we decided to join the reggae adventure and go with them. We got there, paid 12 pounds each to get in (thats a lot on a travellers budget!) and when we got in we were told there was no alcohol for sale because it was a natural, hippy love kind of festival!!! We lasted a bit of time without a drink and drew the line at buying 2 litres of 'mixed' alcohol from the dodgy stalls outside. I loved the randomness of it all - standing in the woods, somewhere in La Paz, in front of a stage that changed colours, with reggae bands that seemed to play salsa and lots of people who were definitely high on more than life. There were metal barrels dotted around where fires were lit to keep the crowds warm. Ever since we've been wearing smokey clothes but it made for a really good atmosphere. When the barrels could no longer keep us as warm as a beer we decided to leave and even managed to sell our wristbands outside afterwards for about half the price, so we even made some money back. Lar refused to sell hers until we got outside, a guy offered us a price and I've never seen someone tear off a wristband so quickly! After that we went back to the hostel bar then ended up in a club called the Blue House until 6am. They sold blue beer which at the time was the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. And we also randomly met up with some of the volunteers who we met at our project in Santa Cruz! So that was fun. But the hangover wasn't so fun - its worse at altitudes. So we never made it to watch the midget wrestling and had to stay an extra night in La Paz just to get over the hangover!!

Then we moved onto Copacabana and Lake Titicaca. Lake Tititcaca was amazing. We took a ferry to the Isla Del Sol which is an island on the lake where legend has it that Inca mythology began. There are Inca ruins and we trekked to the Inca ruins of the temple of the sun. But the most amazing thing was the lake itself. It was just beautiful. The island is steep and our hostel was halfway up to the town (we were too lazy to go the whole way) and the views - they were just breathtaking, I've never seen anything like it. You could look down to the lake which stretches for miles and miles and is just the most amazing blue you can imagine and right in the very distance, poking out of the lake are snowcapped mountains! Every time I looked at that lake it was a different colour. You can tell the lake is at a really high altitude because the clouds seem so much lower and just hang and shimmer over the water. And its not too touristy - most people come for a day trip but we ended up staying 2 nights because Lar got sick with a stomach bug. But we were very happy to be stuck there. Me and Wills spent the day Lar was in bed trekking all the way to the top of the island where you get amazing views at sunset. It was the middle of the day when we were there but the view was spectacular. Because of the blue of the sky and the blue of the lake, the tip of the island just looked like it was floating in mid air. Amazing. I think its maybe the most beautiful place i've ever been.

So because we were a bit delayed we ended up travelling for 20 hours in a row to get from that Island all the way south to Sucre which is where we are now. Sucre is a whitewashed university town with nice temperatures (finally peeled some layers off), lots of cafes, a beautiful plaza and lots of sunshine. Lar hasn't been feeling 100percent so we've taken it easy, explored the city, been for some nice food and today we went to a market (Mercado Americano) a little bit out of town where all stalls sell second hand clothes (like charity shops but millions of them all in the same place). Our next stop is a 3 day tour across the salt plains in Uyuni where it feels like you're on the moon. Its going to be reeeally cold (the tours were cancelled a week or so ago because of so much snow) so we all needed to stock up on layers from the market in Sucre today. I found a really warm coat but I ummed and aaahhed about it and then found this lush (brand new!) thin, biker jacket instead so I bought that!! I'm probably going to be freezing on our tour but I guess thats typical of me - go to a second hand market and come back with a new, cold jacket!!! lol. Wills bought a 1 pound jumper and Lar bought a pink rucksack.... As you can see we are all fully prepared...

We've had a picnic lunch today to save the pennies and tonight we'll be packing again to move on. 10 hours of travelling tomorrow to Uyuni where we start the salt plains tour for 3 days and then we move down to Argentina.

Wills is keeping us entertained with his quotes - like when they were talking about the 2 litre bottles of 'mixed alcohol' at the reggae festival Wills said - what if we wake up in the morning, look in the mirror and we're blind??? The three of us are like a little Philander family and we're back on the road tomorrow for more adventures.

Ciao Ciao Chicos! xx