| Bolivia continued |
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| La Paz La Paz lies at 3700 meters in a valley of the altiplano and the altitude makes the going in the steep streets a lung training experience. To help adjustment to the altitude Coca leaves and coca tea are offered everywhere. To learn a bit more about this culture we visited the Coca museum (which was set up with the help of a dutch institute, of course). The chewing of the leaves or the tea do not have the same effect as a full nasal dosis. However apparently it helps you to absorb more oxygen and enables you to work longer without feeling hungry, which is why kings Philips II of Spain encoraged the use of it in the mines... We tried some during climbs in the mountains, but whether it had a real affect was difficult to say.. The next day we wanted to visit the 'Valle de la Luna' 1 hour outside La Paz. After a couple of hours we finally found from where the local busses went to this valley. The minivans used as local busses can hold up to 21 people plus the so-called 'barker', who yells the destinations out of the window to attract illiterate customers. Needless to say that our european legs (esp. Anita's) don't quite fit between the seats... The valley was a bit of a disappointment after earlier 'Valles de la Luna' in Chile. Together with Bastiaan, a Dutch guy we met in the bar, we spent the next day in Tiahuanacu (Tiwanaku), an archeological site of an ancient civilization (pre inca, from 1200 BC to 1200 DC). Again with the local bus system, 2 hours one way cramped in our seats. The driver kept driving in circles until the required 20 people had entered... After that experience we felt ready to tackle the famous 'death road' (the road from La Paz to Coroico, where on average one car/bus every two weeks goes down a 1000 meter cliff) on a mountainbike. A very touristic thing to do, more than 50 tourist a day do this and many companies offer it.The road goes from 4700 meters down to 1200 over 73 km. About half of it is paved and great speeds can be reached. The interesting part is further down, where the road is narrow and unpaved and downgoing traffic needs to keep left (one meter away from the big drop). All in all it was exhillerating, but never really dangerous. Once down we had 10 minutes to clean the dust from ourselves before the bus that was to take us to Rurrenabaque came around. The trip took about 16 hours, mostly along roads similar to the death road, but fortunately in the dark, so we couldn't see it. Underway we were saved from a injection by a copy of the yellow fever certificate I kept in my wallet. Despite a 1 hour stop to weld the gearbox and another to change a blown-up tire for one that looked like it would blow up pretty soon as well, we arrived on time in Rurre. Rurrenabaque, Jungle and Pampas We just had time to freshen up before we were pushed into a boat to travel 3 hours upriver to the camp in the jungle. Unfortunately the sun, who had woken us up in the bus, exchanged places with thick clouds and after half an hour we had to take cover in our raincoats for the rest of the trip. We shared our camp with only three israelians (which is surprisingly few considering the number that are traveling here), who taught us the card game 'Pingas' while we waited for the rain to stop. That afternoon and the following morning we had a very interesting walking tour through the jungle. Big animals remained in hiding, but the explanations of the medical, nutritional and toxic use of the trees and plants were interesting. The pampas are animalwise a bit more fun. After a jeep trip of 4 hours we were again put in a boat for another 4 hours. From the boat we could see many different animals: Capivaris (large rat-rabbits), aligators (almost jumping in the boat), various monkeys, pink dolphins, watersnakes, lots of different birds and more wildlife. The evening, after catching some small aligators, was a little bring, our hebrew isn� very good and the group consisted of 5 isrealis and us... |
| Just our luck: the next morning it rained again... the only thing to do was some pira�a fishing, which we ate for an early lunch. It dried up a little later on so we could take the boat back to Rurre. Especially the jeep trip back was extreme fun due to the mudbath they call roads around here... Sorata |