La la Paz

Trip Start Jan 23, 2006
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Trip End Jan 31, 2007


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Friday, April 14, 2006

We were immediately struck by the improbable and astonishing setting of the city of La Paz. It runs down into a valley, where houses crawl and creep up the steep slope of the natural valley. It is beautiful and ugly, ordered and dirty and simply paradoxical in every way. Some people love it and others hate it. It is the highest capital city in the world, and at 3700m your lungs bear testimony to that fact! La Paz is only a couple of hours from Lake Titicaca, so we decided to get out there and relax on the Isla de Sol, according to Incan legend, the birth place of the sun, moon and stars. A 3 hour hike from Copocabana and a 1.5 hour paddle boat ride eventually got us to the Isla de Sol - in the pitch dark. There is a maze of networked paths leading all over the Island, and just when we thought we were lost, we found a local who took us the best hostel on the Island. We checked into the hostel Inti-Kala which has amazing views from 300m above the lake of the sunset. The cost is 25 Boliviana per night, so US$3 - amazing Copocabana Roadside
Copocabana Roadside
 ! Matt celebrated his birthday here, with many beers, fresh trout and the best sunset you could wish for on your 30th birthday. The trout is simply superb, and melts in the mouth. Drinking at altitude is not recommended and the following morning we found out why!

Back to La Paz, and straight into downhill mountain biking! There were two options, the "Worlds Most Dangerous Road" or Chakatia to Zongo valley. The most popular is the WMDR, but the MTB company told us the Zongo valley was less busy, more challenging and better scenery. It was their new route and they were rightly so proud of it. The WMDR has the most deaths per year, thankfully not all are bikers! Only 11 mountain bikers have died in the last 10 years! The ride was amazing, with 65 km's of downhill, going from 5200m down to 900m. My braking fingers started cramping about half way through the day, and my smiling/grimacing muscles cramped a little before that! At the end of the day we were exhausted, thrilled and glad to not have plunged 100m over the edge of a cliff!

To celebrate a successful day of high adrenaline, we booked onto the Huayani Potosi 3 day hike. It is a 6088m mountain just out of La Paz. It is quite technical, with 2 large walls of ice/snow to climb and this is done at about 3am and 6am respectively, so in the dark Copocabana shop
Copocabana shop
 . I had vowed never to go to altitude again after Aconcagua, and at 3:30am I remembered why. The kit they gave us was decent, except for the gloves I got. I started to get frost bite on two fingers. The guides tried to warm them up (under their armpits!), but my fingers were having none of it. After a few minutes of sitting in the -12 degree wind, the guides decided me and another guy who also had frostbite should go down. It was an agonising decision, as other than my fingers I felt quite good, but I was not keen to loose a finger or two. I left Matt and Ali to go on to the summit while I headed down to warm water and a warm sleeping bag. They made it to the top, with Ali conquering her fear of heights and Matt bagging his first 6000m peak - and he swears his last too.

Once back in La Paz, we headed out to a great restaurant called La Comidie. We had some of the best food yet in South America - and everyone said the food in Bolivia sucked!

We are about to leave to go the high altitude salt pans in Bolivia South Western corner, still at altitude (3700m) and still loving Bolivia.
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