Camino Real La Paz

... that is good luck when you put them under your doorstep!). People are everywhere selling everything on the streets from bread and bottles of water to batteries and watches and just about anything you could think of. <br><br>They also have a unique city bus program. They use hundreds of minivans that have a driver and a guy who sits up front and yells their route and destination at every intersection and if you want to get on you just wave and ...

... sunshine and pitch conditions must have been difficult. It is apparent from the start that the Brazilians were struggling with the altitude. They hardly ran at all and the Bolivians could literally run rings around them. As a result, Bolivia raced into a spectacular 2-0 lead before half-time! It definitely got the crowd going a bit and we improvised our own chants to support the boys in green.<br><br>The second half was a little more tricky as the Brazilians improved. They had left their ...

... of fishing and tourism and had some small trout enclosures holding fish upto about 15lbs.<br>The Islanders created they´re homes as a refuge from the Incas and other warlike tribes. After an intersting reed boat trip between some of the Islands it was time to head back to Puno and hop on a bus bound for Bolivia.<br>I was able to cross the boarder with almost no hassle and ended up in Copacabana. I had been on the bus with a couple of Frenchies and ...

So, as predicted lat time, we spent a whole lotta time taking advantage of the hammocks at our hotel in Rurrenabaque, watching smugly as group after group came and went after just one night. The general pattern went a bit like this:<br><br>Arrive around 5 pm and step tentatively into the lobby<br><br>Ask about vacancies in halting Spanish<br><br>Follow someone from the hotel back to see a room<br><br>Exhausted and covered in more dried sweat than a daytime hooker ...

... knocking out crisps and pasties so there was no way we would starve, though after the fun and games on the last trip we have been fairly cautious when it comes to street grub.<br>The views as we drove into La Paz were incredible, it was about 6 in the morning and the city occupies a massive natural bowl, with the more affluent neighbourhoods in the bottom of the basin, and the poorer ones climbing literally up the surrounding mountains into the sky at over 4000m. The city ...

... back today with the laptop to do a bit of route planning.<br><br>yesterday we ended up in the posh end of town (Zona Sur) looking for a workshop of one of the bike tour places, so we could buy some brake cable and bits for the bikes. This was definitely a place for 'ladies who lunch' and there were some quite magnificent properties, some with bullet proof doors but all of them with high gates and fences. The other thing I ...

... overly sweet jam, we set forth into the sunshine and stumbled down the hill to the Plazo de San Francisco, where there was a definite buzz of something to come. Hoards of schoolchildren wearing a rainbow of different uniforms and carrying flags were beginning to limber up for what appeared to be some kind of procession. Stern looking Policia carrying truncheons pciked up their wind instruments and began to smile and blow out a colourful andean rendition of a tune which resembled ...

... which I used to have as a pet. Chinchillas have almost been hunted to extinction in the wild here for their coats...i guess viscachas dont have as smooth fur on their backs, but they look and act identical. We got some great footage of them playing amongst the rocks. I almost snagged some viscacha mating going on but was laughing to hard and unable to find them quick enough with the camera before the quick session ended.<br><br>That night ...

... br><br>The next day we decided to head to the most politically incorrect event in La Paz held every Sunday - midget wrestling! We went with some fellow travellers and were unsure whether we should go but took the attitude of when in Rome! We hopped on the bus with other gringos and after about a 30 minute ride ended up at the event. We headed in and there were 100´s of Bolivian families seated around with ring side seat reserved for the ...