A La Paz A La Paz A La Paz

We woke up at 6:00 to get ready to leave the house by 6:50. Debbie made us delicious egg sandwiches and we ate and were out the door. We climbed up a hill the size of the one at Eau Claire, with our backpacks, with 40% less oxygen, at 7 am. It was pretty rough. However, we made it to the bus on time and actually caught an earlier one than we thought we would.

The bus ride went smoothly. In order to get from Copacabana to La Paz you have to cross the straight of Takini. Both you and your bus, go by boat across the straight.

 I sat next to Debbie on the way and she filled me in more about the cultural of domestic violence in Bolivia. She told me stories that made my skin crawl and furious. If you would like to hear more, email or message me individually and I will gladly share. I don’t want to write it here because I will just get mad all over again.

View of La Paz from drive in

Once we got to La Paz, Debbie found us a taxi that would take us to our hostel that we booked the night before. As soon as we were settled in, I took my first shower in a week and a half. It was glorious. I didn’t even pay attention to the huge picture window with no curtain in the middle of the bathroom. I was too excited to be clean.

After we cleaned up, we left to meet Jeff and Debbie at the John Wesley where they were attending to the newly arrived team. We were all going to go yarn shopping. Jeremy decided to come with us since we was feeling a little better at lower altitude. It was exciting to be a trio again. I picked up 6 balls of baby Alpaca yarn that I hope to make a scarf out of. You should feel this stuff; it is like touching a cloud. I guess I don’t actually know what that is like, unless you count touching fog, which doesn’t feel like anything but the point I’m trying to make is that it’s really soft.  

An Example of what the shops looks like. This one is selling llama/alpaca fetus

After shopping, Jeremy was exhausted so we headed back to the hostel. It was hard to part ways with Jeff and Debbie again. They had been such gracious hosts and I loved spending time with them. We hung out at the hostel until dinner time. We went to a pizza place to satisfy Alex’s craving. It was pretty good.

The next morning, we had planned on going to the Valley of the Moon but due to a late start, we just headed to the Prado instead to find a travel agency to book our tour of Bolivia’s salt flats. We found a place with a package we really liked. However, it was just Alex and I so we had to go back and check in with Jeremy. We took a taxi to the hostel to find him worse than before. He decided he wanted to go to the hospital. I called Jeff and Debbie for a recommendation on where to go. They gave me a name of a contact in La Paz. 

Unfortunately, we were unable to find her but we asked the front desk worker that the hostel and she knew a doctor that spoke English. She got him on the phone for me. He told us that it was useless to go to the hospital and told me a list of things to get for Jeremy at the pharmacy, dosage and frequency of administration.

Jeremy and I headed out to pick up his medicines and then met Alex back on the Prado to book our tour. After booking, we grabbed ice cream and took Jeremy back to the hostel.

Alex and I went out to find a grocery store Jeff and Debbie had told us about. It sells some American products and we were pretty excited to see what we could find. We hoped on a bus that we thought would take us close to the area. The guy next to Alex told us where to go and that he was getting off at the same stop and he would walk us there. Right as the stop came up, I looked over at the elderly woman behind me. My gaze was met by her wide eyes and she said, “Do not get off with this man. Stay on the bus.” Compelled by the genuine concern in her voice and eyes, I told Alex to stay on the bus. The man was confused and angry but left the bus. We were later told by several other riders that he was not a good man.

The crazy traffic

After that scare, we were given correct directions about when to depart the bus and where to go. We finally arrived and were in mini heaven. It was really fun to be in a grocery store again, it made me really excited to be in Montevideo because we can buy groceries for more than a day at a time and actually cook meals.

After our shopping spree, we took the bus back to our hostel and stopped at a place to eat right next door. I had salchipapas, a popular street food, which is French fries with cut up hot dog on top. It is usually served smothered in ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise but thankfully, they just handed me packets of the sauces instead.

When w got back, it was time for Jeremy to take his medicine. It was weird to be in charge of that for someone else, making sure they got the right thing, at the right time, in the right amount.

Since we were all exhausted, we called it a early night.

The next morning, we went back to the travel agency to pick up our tickets. After that we ate at Brosso’s, the place  we had ice cream the day before. They had pancakes on their menu and we have been craving those pretty much since day one. They were delicious.

After lunch, we took a minibus to Sagarniga (the shopping district for tourists/witches market). At the first store we went into, I noticed that I no longer had my wallet. Because I paid for lunch, I knew that I either left it on the table in the restaurant or someone on the bus pick pocketed me. We quickly returned to the restaurant to find that it was not there. After thinking back, I can recall the exact moment in which someone most likely took my wallet out of my pocket. Thankfully, I only had a small amount of cash and one debit card. I was able to transfer out my debit card balance until I had time to cancel it.

After this sequence of events, we went back to the market to continue shopping. Bolivia has some amazing works of art, antiques, and jewels. Our dollar also stretches the farthest here, so we finally picked up some souvenirs.

Yes, I do double as a pack mule

We continued shopping until it was time to catch our bus to the salt flats. We left at 6 for another 14 hour ride. Once again, it was fairly uneventful . 

VIP Seating