Bolivia
December
3, 2012 - The ride to La Paz started well enough. We
meandered through some highlands and after taking a rickety
ferry ride across a channel, ended back on the mainland of
Bolivia.
The ferry ride was a non-adventure, although initially it looked a tad more dicey than it actually was. It was quick and cheap. We arrived at the dock and basically rolled straight on to one of the many floats crossing to the other side.
After a few hours, the rain started and by the time we were thirty or so kilometers from La Paz, it started snowing. The temperature dropped quite quickly and in no time we were wiping ice and snow from our visor every few minutes. Dripping wet and covered in mud from all the road construction, we arrived at Hotel Fuentes in La Paz. After an initial hesitation, we got a reasonable quote for a room. Andy and Linda were here too and we made plans to go for dinner after we had showered and arranged all our dripping wet gear in a safe spot.
La Paz is an ok place to kill a few days but it has little in terms of real sites.
I wandered around Plaza San Francisco a bit but the photographic harvest was quite modest. A common theme on our trip has been the penetration of cell phones everywhere. In the city, out in the country, everyone seems to be connected to their smart or not so smart mobiles.
Poverty is still visible everywhere.
Where we were staying was right in the old "witches market", where all sorts of potions can be bought to cure all ails. Or you can buy dried lama fetuses as offerings to the gods.
La Paz and Bolivia in general feel a bit odd to me. I can't quite put my finger on it, whether it's the fact you need to pay three times the local price for gas as a foreigner, or the general attitude that foreigners are "targets". If you don't ask and agree on a price beforehand, it is always a bad surprise.
People are not very warm compared to other South American countries and are borderline unfriendly. We did have a few nice dinners with Linda and Andy at the top of a hotel overlooking the city.
The next stop is Uyuni, to visit the salt flats.