Right after some time in the capital La Paz we bussed it North to the edge of Lake titicaca, the town was called Copacabana and the weather was sweet nice and warm and sunny. We decided to rest up a day or so then went to an Island on the lake called Isla del sol, this is where the Inca creation story began and the first Inca people are descendants from lake Titiacaca and it´s islands. We caught the worlds slowest boat there and spent a night at the northern part of the island – i went wandering along the ridge line to see an Inca settlement and the sacred lama sacrifical rock and Inca sun stone, Claire was feeling rough and didn´t come along.
After Isla del sol we stayed another day in Copacabana and then wandered over the border into PERU…
Uyuni – This started with a very amusing bus ride we had a protest in a random village that blocked the road then got stuck int he river bed as we tried to cross a dry river (they were fixing the bridge). And Uyuni (pronounced Uni) is another souless place it is basically there to produce salt as it is right ont he edge of a large salt pan called Salar de Uyuni – it looks like a deserted town as you approach ont he bus. We arranged a3 day jeep tour around the area taking in the sites of the salar – old hotels made from salt – cactus island – volcanoes – thousands of flamingoes – sunrise – lagoons of various colours – stone trees – Lama – Alpaca, this was a great trip really recommended. It is a relly surreal place where the white salt looks like water and the mountains and volcanoes appear to be floating…. odd…food was ace (lama) to and our travelling companions were great with the traslation.
La Paz – Bolivia capital – bustling and full of the normal travellers tat – i´ve had the shits for 2 days now and hopefully they are now under control – we ahve been to a museum or 4 and are just relaxing before pushing north to lake titicaca.
Right,
sorry for the delay, all i can say is that internet in bolivia is crap and i thought we had it bad in the uk.
Right so we got the old Death Train into bolivia from Corumbab ont he bordert with Brazil – the reason it is called the death train is becase back in the 80´s it was so full of contraband that it would frequently derail and kill people but we found it to be boring beyond beliefe – it takes 18 hours at best and the carriages are poor to say the least – but it was a good thing to do – as it pull sinto stations kids- women – men all jump on to try and flog you their wares. The scenery is very samey and is basically swamp and wetlands right up to the track 8i.e the bolivia Pantanal). The train arrives into santa Cruz whihc is a oretty crummy place – a sprawling urban jungle that we soon left.
Samaipata – we took a shared taxi for 3 hours to a hill top town called samaipata – it was a very chilled oput place – very un touristy and comprised of one central plaza and about 10 streets. We came here to go and see the pre Ince forte (El Fuerte) some 10km from the village. claire and I walked up there in the sun and marrzeled at the archilogical find. We only saw ahandful of poeple all day and it was like you had the place to yourselves – we were about 3km up and we saw a condor fly below us. Pretty cool – the ruins are interesting with a mix of inca walls and pre inca civilizations (they are still digging at the site ) and as of yet they are still piondering its significance but they think that due to it´s location int he foothills of the andes it was a meeting/trade spot for lowland and upland peoples. very interesting.
Sucre – we traveled next to Bolivias old capital – a lovely colonial looking city (large town) with terrecota roofs reminiscent of Florence in Rome. We relaxed here for a few days and saw some dino footprints that are now in a cement quarry (basically they were found as the workers were blowing up the walls and they are dino prints) bit of a con mind u as you can´t get closer than 50m so they could be anything – the dino prints come from when some of bolivia was underwater covered by see and the dino prints were part of the shore line (or so they say). Other than that we relaxed in the sun.
Potosi – next we wnet to the worlds highest city, Potosi (some 4km+ ) and what a crap whole that was – the only reason for the cities existance is the dominating mountain they call Cerro Rico (Beautiful mountain) whihc is a silver mine and funded the spanish empire for 200 years in its hey day. Event eh guides say that if there was no mine there would be no one here. basically I signed up for a min tour whihc involves getting dressed in protective gear and climbing down a mine that is from 45 degrees c to -15 and then coping with altitude and dust. the areveage life expectancy of a miner is still 28 years and they die of silicous posoining or lung cancer – it is the worst place u can imagine (and being tall is a no go). 40 people die each year int eh mine from cave ins alone and there are over 15,000 that work in on around the mine. health and saftey…….. whats that? ; )
You can buy dynamite from age 9 and it costs 17 Bolivians (just over 1 pound ) for a 5 min fuse, dynamite and something extyra to go bang…. fucking madness – i must sya that i bought some for a presnet for the mineres and didn´t feel safe as we drove up to the mine with the stick of bang band in between my balls….
