Unruly Students!!!!

Trip Start Mar 17, 2005
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Trip End Mar 13, 2006


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Flag of Bolivia  ,
Thursday, December 8, 2005

After opting for the 1 hour flight from Trinidad instead of the 36 hour bus ride we found ourselves back in La Paz and excited to visit a very famous part of Bolivia, the Salar de Uyuni salt plains, which are supposed to be otherworldly. Instead, we found that students throughout the country of Bolivia had taken it upon themselves to roadblock every major road leading out of La Paz to any other major place in Bolivia in their quest to get the government (the presidential election date was approaching within a couple weeks) to do something. We heard it had to do with wanting universities in the rural areas, but who knows. All we knew was that we waited in La Paz for 3 days and the road blocks were still going strong. Some buses were going the direction we wanted by that time but we were told that usually involved leaving at night and driving at high speeds through desert roads without their lights on so the students couldn`t see them.

So, we opted to take the one road that they didn´t manage to blocked effectively and head back up to Peru, thereby skipping the salt flats (major bummer!) in hopes that we can maybe visit them from Chile later.

Sadly during our bus ride from Bolivia to Peru we had a very disturbing experience and got to see the drug issues of these countries firsthand. Colombia, Peru and Bolivia are the top three producers of cocaine in the world. During our 8 hour bus ride we sat next to a 25 year old woman and 10 year old girl (maybe her daughter, maybe hired to look like her daughter) who both appeared to be Bolivian. We are fairly certain (pretty much 100% certain) that they were smuggling cocaine into Peru in a backpack they had hidden on the bus. They were very anxious the whole ride, especially when our bus was stopped for a drug roadside check. The police officer who came onboard walked directly to her in the back row of the bus and pushed her seat up. After a minute or two of them not really looking for it we believe we saw her hand the police officer some money and he left the bus. We were dumbfounded that they weren´t arrested and nothing was confiscated. The whole drug check seemed like a total scam and it was so obvious to everyone around us on the bus what was going on. We were really torn about how to deal with it and were disappointed to see that she seems to be a regular on this route and the police are just making money off of it as well. Overall very disappointing and discouraging.

The few saving graces about being in La Paz longer than we expected? The best french toast we´ve found in 9 months, and a fantastic sports bar serving amazing food with US sports on TV at night. That is about it.
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