Higher than High: La Paz to Cochabamba

Bolivia, Day 4: Cochabamba

At 5 a.m. this morning we were up and out of bed. After an icy cold nipple-hardening shower, we gathered up our friends Chris and Misti from the La Paz airport. They finally made it here after a 3-day passport-related delay. We checked out of the hotel, grabbed some grub, exchanged some dollars, and were off to the La Paz bus station with our 7 giant suitcases full of donations for the wildlife refuge, Inti Wara Yassi. The bus terminal was chaotic, with drivers and bus brokers shouting out city names in a desperate attempt to solicit our ticket business. Eliana used her incredible street haggling skills and negotiated our bus fares from 40 Bolivianos down to 15 Bolivianos ($2 US) each! The rest of the day was spent on a bus on an 8 hour journey from La Paz to Cochabamba.

We were promised there would be a bathroom on the bus, but to our dismay the bathroom on this bus was busted. Rotten luck. About 2 hours into the trip, Eliana’s full and painful bladder was about ready to explode. Without a rest stop coming anytime soon, we racked our brains trying to figure out how she could relieve herself before an imminent bladder rupture. Could she use a pocket knife to cut off the top of a plastic water bottle and pee in it from her seat? Maybe go into a plastic bag? Just do it right in her pants and deal with the consequences later? She jumped out of her seat and walked up the aisle to the driver. “Si usted no para el bus ahora mismo, voy a orinar en la silla!” (“If you don’t stop the bus right now, I’m going to urinate on the seat!”) The bus driver pulled over on the highway and Eliana ran off into the roadside brush. Marc shielded her from the view of the curious bus passengers with a jacket, and out went a long flowing stream. Ahhhh.... what a relief! A taxi driver gave her a honk as she mooned him from the side that Marc could not shield.

We thought La Paz at 12,000 feet above sea level was high. Well, the journey on the bus brought us up to a maximum elevation of 14,675 feet! (We had the GPS running to monitor our location/elevation). Chest pains, knotted stomachs, and dizziness began affecting Misti, Chris, and Eliana. The horrible on-board horror movie combined with a deafeningly loud soundtrack, the smell of Bolivian body odor and empanadas, stuffy air, and high altitude was a fatal recipe for soroché (altitude sickness). Marc hung tough and wasn’t really phased by it. Chris fared the worst and began puking after prolonged exposure above 14,000 feet.

Once we started descending again, things got better and we all enjoyed the scenic views of the Andean mountains and plains. After a grueling journey, we finally arrived in Cochabamba (8000 feet). We found a hotel near the bus station (Hostal Florida) which was unfortunately pretty dirty with intermittent unpleasant sewer odors emanating from the bathroom. Nevertheless, we were able to get a bit of shut-eye and prepare for the next day’s journey to Villa Tunari and the wildlife refuge, Inti Wara Yassi, the trip’s primary focus. 

Civilizations Come and Gone

Bolivia, Day 3: Tiwanaku Ruins

Eliana woke up miserable from a night of puking, headaches, and dizziness. That cheese fondue really did a number on her GI tract, and our plans for the day were up in the air because of her nauseated condition. After some Aleve, breakfast, and a tincture of time, by 10 o’clock she was feeling much better and decided an adventure was in order after all! We were off to explore the ancient ruins of the Tiwanaku civilization.

We made our way to the cemetery district of La Paz to catch a ride to Tiwanaku. Transportation on most local routes in Bolivia is accomplished by small buses or mini-vans called micros. Micros stop just about anywhere for anyone, until every available crack of space has been filled with people, luggage, and livestock -- and even then the driver’s assistant will insist there’s still room for one more passenger. We packed in to the mini-van with a total of EIGHTEEN people -- 3 in the front seats, and 15 people in the back (3-4 people crammed in per row). The back seats are positioned so closely together to maximize passenger load, that you have to shift your knees sideways to compensate for the minuscule leg room. It’s quite comical, actually. Just when we thought the ride couldn’t get any more absurd, the driver decided to take a detour to avoid paying a toll. We drove for a while on a potholed bone-shaking dirt road with a bus in front of us stirring up clouds of dust, and finally we had to cross through a river (!), that the previous micro apparently didn’t make (it was sitting stuck in the water). Luckily, we made it through and arrived at our destination in about 90 minutes -- all that fun for a bus fare of only 8 Bolivianos (about $1 US)!

The ancient ruined city of Tiwanaku is one of the most monumental and intriguing archeological sites in South America. Founded some 2000 years ago, Tiwanaku became the capital of a massive empire that lasted almost a thousand years, developing into a sophisticated urban-ceremonial complex that in many ways was the cradle of Andean civilization. We explored the ruins and learned how their society declined and faded out abut a thousand years ago due to severe drought and migration out the area.

Their pyramids, statues, and structures were purposefully buried in anticipation of returning when climate conditions improved. However, they were followed by Inca civilization and then invasion by the Spaniards, and never returned. The ruins were discovered only in recent years and only an estimated 7% have been excavated to date. 

Three fun young hippie travelers from Spain joined us on the bus ride back. We swapped travel stories, and enjoyed a walk through the streets of La Paz where we gawked at local meats (sheep heads and dried llama meat were quite a disturbing sight), produce, and trinkets. It’s reassuring to know that we are not the only venturesome (and a little loco!) travelers out there.

Moon Valley

Bolivia, Day 2: Valle de la Luna

After a noisy night sleeping above the city streets and missing the comfort of our own bed, we awoke to another gorgeous sunny day in La Paz. Before we arrived in Bolivia, we had been following the La Paz weather which was rain, rain, and more rain... amazingly the last 2 days have been nothing but dry, clear, and sunny in the 60's -- literally perfect weather.

We started the day with a simple breakfast in our hotel of puffy Bolivian cereal (quinoa I think), local fruits, fresh baked bread, orange juice, and coca tea. Coca tea is brewed with the leaf of the coca plant, the plant notoriously used to manufacture cocaine -- but the leaf is consumed as a cure-all for altitude sickness, headaches, and many ailments. It was pretty tasty actually! After eating and chatting with an enthusiastic German traveler that had just spent the last 8 weeks traveling solo in the Andes, we headed down to the San Francisco Cathedral to catch a "micro" bus (basically a packed-to-capacity mini-van) to Valle de la Luna (Moon Valley) to do some hiking. On our walk down the steep narrow sidewalks of La Paz, it became apparent to the both of us that it was Palm Sunday, as the locals were buzzing about going to church and buying and selling intricately weaved palm leaves made into religious tchotchkes. We enjoyed watching the colorful locals in their traditional dress congregating and selling their holiday goods and foods. The micro bus fare was only 30 cents for a half hour ride to travel several miles away -- we still can't figure out how that even covers the cost of gas!

Valle de la Luna lies south of La Paz just beyond the suburbs and is a nice escape down below 10,500 feet to do some light hiking. It's a stretch of eerie cactus-strewn badlands scarred by deep canyons and strange formations of clay and rock carved by seasonal rains into pinnacles resembling church organ pipes. We walked the main loop in the park and took lots of photos, rested intermittently to give Eliana’s aching knee a break, and Marc finally got his GPS working here after fiddling with the Garmin menus for a while. Coincidentally, once he got the GPS operational, a geocache called "Espinoso" popped up on the map only 0.2 miles away!

After the first 2 attempts to access the cache location ended with peering down some serious vertical drop-offs, we finally figured out the location -- only the cache was nowhere to be found. Oh, well - good attempt anyway and we found some interesting trails in our quest. After hiking, we continued the adventure on to the village of Mallasa, where we had an overpriced lunch at a Swiss restaurant (Hotel Oberlander) with a nice view of the mountains. After filling our bellies with cheese fondu, we hopped on another microbus back to La Paz and made our way back to the hotel where we took a delicious late afternoon nap. Tonight we are feeling sunburned, headachy, and tired, but are already planning our day trip tomorrow to the ruins of Tiwanaku.

Addendum: Eliana got completely sick at night, puked her guts out, had a sore knee and a horrible headache until the next morning. Musta been the cheese fondue. Guacala!

Arrival in Bolivia

Bolivia, Day 1: La Paz

Eliana and I arrived in La Paz, Bolivia, after a 7 hour sleep on a red-eye flight from Miami. Our primary goal for this trip is to deliver donated veterinary supplies to Inti Wara Yassi, a wildlife refuge in Bolivia, that is in desperate need of equipment. Bolivia is one of the most biologically diverse countries in the world, and also the poorest country in South America. While we’re here, we’re also planning a few interesting side trips to various Bolivian cities, and will be joined by our South Florida friends Chris and Misti (a.k.a. the “SeaAggies”).

Our travel partners, Misti and Chris, got turned away while checking in at the Miami airport, so have not joined the adventure yet. Chris’s passport was still valid, but was expiring in 2 months ... and American Airlines dropped the huge bomb of news on us that his passport needed to be valid for at least 6 months. Inconsistent with what we had previously heard on travel to Bolivia, and in light of the fact that the Bolivian embassy still issued him a visa, American airlines issued him a round-trip ticket, and that this rule was nowhere to be found except at check-in time... we were all pretty bummed that they had to delay traveling. We are going to wait for them in La Paz until their arrival on Tuesday after Chris gets a new passport.

We felt rather uneasy going through Bolivian customs with all of our donated vet supplies. We didn’t want any trouble or have to pay insane import taxes on all the supplies. As fate and random bad luck would have it -- Eliana pressed the customs inspection button and the light turned red on us -- which meant we were selected for an inspection of our luggage. Doh! A customs officer searched our bags and in the second bag discovered our huge supply of syringes and needles for the wildlife refuge and we’re sure the words “drug dealers” popped into his head. Our heartbeats started racing when he removed them from our bag and visions of Bolivian jail began drifting through our heads. Fortunately, Eliana smooth talked the customs officer and flashed the notarized letter we had from the consulate and they let us through with everything. Nice!

Arrival in La Paz at 11,000 feet above sea level has left us a little short of breath, but not too bad, we are doing fine. Sometimes going up the hills here can leave you a bit winded, but we are adjusting well. The weather has been gorgeous, sunny and warm during the day -- the morning was a little chilly around 40 degrees but it warmed up fast into the 60’s. Eliana’s two bad fingers were pretty achy and sore from being exposed to the cold mornings.

We are staying at Hostal Estrella Andina hotel in La Paz, which seems reasonable so far. I’ve tried using my Garmin GPS here in La Paz and cannot get a satellite signal. We spent the day wandering through the “witch market”, La Paz’s buzzing tourist street market, browsing thru handicrafts and enjoying coffee and breakfast in cafes. Also visited the San Francisco Cathedral. Took a long nap in the afternoon and started working on our blog material.

Chao amigos!