You know, in Bolivia they have a phrase - 'Camina lentito, come poquito... y duerme solito' wise words indeed. It basically means 'walk slowly, eat only a little bit... and sleep by your poor little self'. So what about me? Have I followed these wise words? Well can you imagine me walking fast at this altitude with all the very steep streets, and the food (believe me you only want to eat a little), and I've no chance of messing up on the last bit even if I wanted to!!

Well hi (or should that be high) people. You now find me in the world´s highest (de facto) capital city La Paz (Sucre is really the capital I guess). I got here about 3 days ago and this big city, which sprawls from a low valley to high up in the hills is extremely noisey, very very dirty, packed to the rafters with street vendors/markets, people in silly hats and killer taxis, has no traffic control (let's just say I've nearly been killed about 8 times trying to cross roads at official pedestrian crossings) and it is bloody freezing cold or raining most of the time. Mind you I have had some fun here and I do quite like the manic feel to the place.

On the first day most of the group went loopy and mountain-biked 80ks in snow and rain down the world's most dangerous road. I played it safe and decided to go shopping in what must be the world's most un-shoppable city - 4 hours later drenched from torrential rain and street drain bursts (disgusting) I got back to the hotel with exactly the same on me as I had when I left the hotel (I was cold, wet and defeated!!). Oh well a good night followed and we all went out on the town to party til 7.30 in the morning (yes the night life is particularly good, though I doubt even Bolivia can claim it's the world's best). Yesterday was a day of recovery and also time to say goodbye to some members of the group (including Brent our group leader) and hello to some new people (including Carolina our new group leader). We all went out for dinner but by 10pm everyone from the night before was falling asleep so you found us all on a Saturday night in bed by 11pm god knows what the new lot thought (but don't worry we'll show them).

Today I thought it was time for some culture at last, so I booked onto a tour to Tiwanaka which is Bolivia's most significant archaeological site, dating back from 2000 BC. And it was pretty interesting but I reckon with Peru knocking on the door I'm going to see a lot more impressive stuff.

Oh and before La Paz, we took a hellish night bus (which included one of Bolivia's infamous road blocks/strikes big boulder stones were used to stop the bus carrying on until we all paid for the blocking objects to be removed) to Bolivia's 3rd largest city, a university city called Cochabamba this place is full of museums, has another big Jesus high up on a hill and also is renowned for its churches and cathedrals - so an ideal opportunity for more culture. Ha ha!We chose Championship League Football (I went along for the drinking aspect), lots of beer and cheap rum, giant pizzas, empty discos and karoke. Brilliant.

Anyway, tomorrow it's bye bye Bolivia, as we make our way to Peru. I must say this country has been harder to travel in than the rest of Sth Am. The buses and roads are laughable - and that's without the road blocks, the toilets are not laughable, it takes 3 times longer to do anything here than anywhere else I've been to and it's the only place since I started travelling many moons ago where I've been very very sick, but what a beautiful and interesting place it has proved to be and I figure my favourite country so far in Sth America. In fact I'll miss Bolivia, a lot.

Adios

xxx