Leaving Peru for my next country Bolivia

Trip Start Jan 04, 2008
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Trip End Dec 17, 2008


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Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Yet another early start of 6.30 am to catch a bus from Puno to La Paz via the border at Kasani and a lunch stop at the little town of Copacabana on the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca. The bus takes a very scenic route along the edge of the lake to get to the border where the immigration formalities of leaving Peru and entering Bolivia were very smooth I´m pleased to report ... another new stamp in the increasingly full passport pages and into country number ten on my trip. After the border stop we headed to Copacabana which was only 8km and 15 minutes away. We were given about one hour for lunch in Copacabana and we had to change buses here as the Peruvian bus we had arrived on was going back on the return leg to Puno and we needed to board a Bolivian bus bound for La Paz. An hour was plenty enough time for a nice lunch of "trucha" (trout) down by the lakeside (where there are lots of little eateries) and a brief look around the little town. The shoreline is also covered in lots of (idle) swan pedaloes without any customers ... maybe it gets busy on weekends and holidays , who knows ? The main highlight of Copacabana apart from the Lake Titicaca setting seems to be the quite enormous moorish-style cathedral in the main plaza Border 1
Border 1
 . Otherwise it really just seems to be a service town for the lake with all the usual mass of tour agencies , hostels , restaurants & shops/stalls selling the usual tourist targeted products which can be found everywhere. Overall I´m rather glad I had decided to crack straight on to La Paz ... having seen the lake already on the Peruvian side I don´t think I would have got anything different and new out of a stay here so good to save some precious time. I guess it´s that time again as I leave a country , this time Peru , for my usual brief closing summary. There are two top highlights of Peru for me which stand out during my seven week stay in the country. Of course it almost goes without saying that the Inca Trail trek to Machu Picchu is one of them ... it was really superb & met all my expectations that it would be one of the highlights of the whole of South America. The other top highlight I would say was my time in Arequipa where I was volunteering at Chachani Village teaching the kids English ... this was a remarkably rewarding , different and humbling experience for me ... something I wont forget in a hurry and hopefully the sort of thing that I will have the chance to do more of in the future. I enjoyed the capital , Lima , possibly more than I thought I would , and it was good timing to be there for the "Fiestas Patrias" , the July 28th celebration of Peruvian independence day. I also found Trujillo surprisingly good - the attractive colonial city in the north of Peru which also has the nearby archaelogical Moche/Chimu sites of Chan-Chan and the Huacas del Sol y de la Luna Border 2
Border 2
 . Cuzco is undoubtedly a very attractive city aesthetically and thus its easy to see why it is such a popular place , especially also when you consider the history and splendour of all the surrounding Inca ruins in the "Sacred Valley" ... but for me Cuzco is somehow a victim of it´s own success and it was simply too touristy ... I´m not too keen on the places where you literally cannot walk anywhere without coming across loads & loads of other tourists. Overall , however , Peru has been really great and whilst I have to note there were some other places I would have liked to have visited (most notably Huaraz, Ica & Nazca) , unfortunately I just had to skip them in order to find the necessary time so spend a month volunteering ... for me personally and the big picture in terms of the overall experience I wanted this year , this was undoubtedly a well worthwhile trade-off for me to make so I´m very happy I have made the right choices.
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