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La Paz-Sorata-Oruro (26-31 Oct. 1999)

The first experience of Bolivians was that they use tourists as economical benefit. Just to pass through the first town after the border we had to pay money. The town, Copacabana, wasn't really much to see, but the road towards the Tiquina ferry provided some great views of the Titicaca lake. After having passed the strait of Tiquina we reached La Paz, the economical capital of Bolivia. The first views of La Paz, arriving from the west, were beautiful. Down in the centre, all streets take you steeply up the walls of the cauldron. Unfortunately, walking to the top of the cauldron is too much of an effort, so instead we spent two days walking around the main streets and squares of the centre, and making our first visits to McDonald's in South America. We incidentally met the Norwegian girls that we had met on the Inka Trail and ended up watching the same movie as them in the cinema. I bought a camera for a typical Swedish price, i.e. cheaper than the rest of South America. Finally we could start taking real photos again after having developed some really poor photos from a single use camera bought in Puno. Then it was time to go to Yungas, a famous mountain area north of La Paz. We went to the supposedly most beautiful village in Bolivia, Sorata. There should have been great views of high and steep mountains from this village, and it looked promising on the way back from Sorata two days later...

Unfortunately, we were too unpatient in waiting for the clouds to leave the Sorata valley. We spent one day walking and hitchhiking to the San Pedro cave - a short and popular trip that provided descent views of Sorata (see above) and surrounding canyons (see left). The cave per se was extremely warm and humid, and the bats were really hard to spot, but at least we had been there and seen them. We met a group of Swedish people that were studying in La Paz on the way back to Sorata. In fact, we had met much more Swedes in Bolivia than in Peru just after a few days and we started to wonder if Swedes were afraid of Peru...
     Well, we had planned to take a guided trek through the surrounding mountain area the next day, but when encountering an even cloudier day than the day before we became tired and jumped on the lunch bus back to La Paz. Of course, the views of Cordillera Blanca on the way back and the weather the morning after were superb. Then, however, we had already left for the first town south of La Paz, Oruro. This place seemed quite boring in the beginning, but was in fact quite pleasant with cheap fast-food restaurants and cinemas. In fact, the town was quite wealthy with well-dressed people, mostly of native origin and we started to think that Bolivians were better than Peruvians both in terms of wealth and looks...

Parque Nacional de Lauca