Hotel Cortez Santa Cruz

... a plane from La Paz to Rurrenabaque, and supplies for the journey - including Coca leaves as we will briefly be in the altitude before ehading back down to Rurrenabaque. The best cost and time effective way to go to Rurrenabque was to go through La Paz. In Rurrenabaque plan on visiting the Pampa for a couple of days, Piranha fishing, anaconda hunting and caiman feeding on the plan (along with feeding the mosquitoes but we will try not ...

I have been in Bolivia for about a week now. I have a story still waiting in Peru, and a few cities to catch up on here in Bolivia. <br><br>After my Machu Picchu trek, I decided to hit the bus down to Puno, the base of Lake Titicaca. From what i have been told lake Titicaca is absolutely marvelous.....unless you reside in Alaska. The Puno side of Titicaca has a unique feature probably no where else in the world. Floating islands, believe it ...

... crashed up and down waking everyone on the bus to gasps and concerns. The bus pulled over and for about an hour they fiddled with the engine, pumping gasoline from a large barrel sitting in the passenger seat of the bus directly into the engine. We were trapped in the middle of nowhere but eventually the bus moved again. At around 6am I awoke. We were trudging along a paved road maybe going 20mph. At 9 ...

... Yea, we weren´t so keen to see the inside of Paraguay´s prison system. So we stuck to Argentina and took a bus the long way round.<br>- getting fed meals on the bus, watching movies and the scenery go by outside. Though not so keen on the return of the Ham and Cheese sandwiches: an Argentinian staple. <br>- getting to Iguazu in a thunderstorm and heavy rain. The Falls will be awesome...

... guy who had to come in to issue us our visas! So he gave us a really funny look and I was trying to explain why we were in Bolivia for only 2 hours. We must not have been too suspicious-looking because they did let us back out of the country. Then on arrival back in Brasil, the same official who stamped us out, also stamped us back in! And he remembered us too! So we held up the line for a little while trying to explain why ...

... poverty stricken country in South America, although in the few days we have been here we have actually found it far more modern and sophisticted than Southern Brazil. Santa Cruz despite being Bolivia´s biggest city really has a very small town feel. It is based around a Spanish style main square, Plaza 24 de Septembre, which is a scenic spot to watch the world go by. It is lined with palm trees, lovely pavements, manicured lawns and there are lots of tables ...

... later on your own) AND HEAD STRAIGHT FOR THE MOUNTAIN WHEN YOU ARRIVE AT MP OR YOU'LL MISS OUT AND BE AS ANNOYED AS I WAS!!! MP was amazing and the entire trek was one hell of an amazing experience and I would recommend it to anyone. The only downside is that if you believe, like I did, that by doing the trek that you arrive at MP ahead of all the day trippers then you are sorely mistaken. When we arrived the place was swarming with people that ...

... building, manned by two guys, on a sandy "road". There were a number of plastic tables set up outside with women asking if you needed to change money (I had none) or filling out the entrance forms for people who I assume were illiterate. When I enetered the room I was greeted by the large, cap wearing guy behind a small wooden desk, behind which were a number of weird posters of presumably national icons, with "Ah, gringo, welcome to Bolivia". Excellent. He asked some questions which ...

... with 11 children each!! <br>I was the first travelling volunteer FAMUNDI had received and what a great experience it was. I was fortunate enough to be there on the 5th day of the month which is when FAMUNDI hands out the monthly food portions to each of the 36 families. The portions consist of: <br>3kg of potatoes <br>3kg of onions <br>1kg of flour (2 due to winter when i was there) <br>1kg of pasta <br>1kg of sugar <br>1kg of rice <br><br>Each of the 36 ...