Hotel Libertador La Paz

... it was back to feeding the pigeons and watching the youngsters hopping around on those bouncy leg extensions, which must have been hard work because at this altitude just walking wears you out.

It's 9.30pm and you could be forgiven for thinking that we have the South American version of the Eurovision Song Contest going on a block or so away. The fireworks are going full tilt and there are people with loudspeakers encouraging all kinds of chanting, but we can't understand ...

... the night´s lodgings cost 1.80PS! for a bed with clean linen and an electric ceiling light. No sink; no furniture- outside loo and no running water. Superb view of the lake and the beach right outside. Perfecto.
UP at 6am and had to walk to the southern end of the island by 10.30 to catch the return boat. It was a hard walk and I´d been told it was a 3 hour trek and at 2 hours into it, I was only halfway,legs tired, and puffing on the hills (altitude) and wondering if I ...

... though - my new mouth looks grand and I think Mrs Turner won´t notice any difference, until it falls out in a few years at least. It feels weird in my mouth and the new tooth seems very sensitive to low temperatre, so maye I can´t have any more popsicles or Ben & Jerry´s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough ice cream :o(

In summary:
- The olivian helthcare system is grand. Although it did cost about half the typical Bolivian wage, but only slightly above my excess so I can ...

... sac. Nous sommes tres peu dans l´avion qui est un Boeing 727 donc assez gros. Décollage all right, 50 minutes de vol, attérissage plus chaotique mais le détour vaut la peine avec une arrivée sur des montages et La Paz apparaissant dans une cuvette.
Arrivée stressée pour moi. Comment vais - je réagir a l´altitude? Nous sortons sur le tarmac. Seb m´avait gentillement conseillé de me bourrer la bouche ...

... a bit more up to date (we found the net book but as you can see I am still a long way behind with the blog)!! Sam did his best to haggle but they weren’t for moving on the price - I guess technology costs the same everywhere.

Our city tour showed us the main sites, Moon Valley and the main squares, witches market etc. In a rather grand square by the presidents official offices they had a stand set up in which appeared to be all the local dignitaries ...

... We then passed round a bottle of 100% proof grain alcohol, pouring some on our front tire and on the ground then taking a sip to appease primeval Inca Earth Goddess Pacha Mama!


Setting off down the tarmac section most people were a bit nervous as there are a lot of horror stories going around most true of people really messing themselves up badly..
Just the day before a guy went over the cliff and broke both arm and leg, while
a month ago a guy died going off a ...

... delicacy: Snake alcohol. And it is exactly as it sounds...a bottle of spirits that also contains a whole snake...some poisonous Peruvian variety, but surely he was drunk before he died and this bottle is the remains of that marriage. It looked absolutely disgusting, and only 3 of our party were brave enought to do a shot...all credit to Grant, Kitty and whomever the third person was, because you couldn´t pay me to drink that!! Yuck

So after returning to dry land from our boat adventure we thought we were done with all this lake stuff. Wrong. To our surprise (not mentioned in our reliable guide books) our bus journey to La Paz got interrupted by a Lake crossing. For this we got ushered off the bus onto one raft whilst our bus followed on another raft. Looking back to our bus at this point was a bit disconcerting.

On our arrival to La Paz we passed through the outskirts of town. I´m always wary of big cities ...

... of la Alta which is high above the city and where there is an enormous open air market which sells everything. We heard we could find some good motorcycle parts there cheap. This market goes on for miles in several directions but we did find the auto parts and motorcycle parts of the market and were able to get a few things to help us get the bikes running and to be able to fix tires while on the ...

... rate does help. With so many people outside employment and with no benefit system, the country trades entirely on the black market. However, at least the country is incredibly wealthy in terms of minerals and gases which must bring them benefits in the future.

A side note here: The Iranians are generously giving their expertise in the extraction of natural gas and the Bolivians are exporting Uranium in return. Under the beautiful salt flats of ...