When the bus was trundling along to La Paz, the capital of Bolivia, we passed through the vast flat expanse of El Alto before it seamed like the ground just fell away, delivering a massive valley with a city built into the bowl and the suburbs carved into the cliffs on every side. We had arrived in the highest capital city in the world. At 4070m high the runway at the international airport is twice as long as normal airports to account for the lack of oxygen, and pilots need special training to land at the difficult airport.
The lack of oxygen has caused few problems for us. We haven't suffered from altitude sickness, but you find yourself out of breath rather quickly. You have to remind yourself whenever you walk up a hill (of which there are a lot of) that if you walk at normal pace you will be stuffed by the time you get to the top. Which makes it interesting to see football being played here. Bolivia rarely loose when they play at home, scoring 6-0 against Argentina not too long ago. I went to a La Paz game whilst I was here and shortsightedly bought a jersey at the start of the game... before their 2-1 loss.
We've knuckled down a little, Jon has been working on his webpage and I've been working on my French, so we've enjoyed a different kind of travel in La Paz, one more of a resident than a tourist and hence we've had time to meet a lot of other travelers along their paths. Old faces from Sucre have mixed with new faces from La Paz and melded together in the nights at pubs and clubs across the city, playing pool, quizzes, drinking or dancing.
We travelled back up the windy road that is cut into the cliff on our way to El Alto to visit the famous Cholita Wrestling I'd read in National Geographic years before. A Cholita is a traditionally dressed woman who can usually be found selling her good in the markets and streets of Bolivia, although more upper class ladies are starting to dress "Cholita" as a cultural symbol. The performance was perhaps a little long winded, but it was entertaining never the less.
DVD's a plenty are to be had in LA Paz and at only $0.90 a pop and a DVD player in my room I have succumb to their pleasure. Dumbo was a highlight not only for nostalgic reasons, but also for the surreal Pink Elephants scene in the middle. If you can't remember it, please hire it as it is mind blowing.
Jon had seen quite enough old bricks in the ground so some fellow Victorian travellers and I made our way out to the ruins at Tiwanco. It's amazing that the Inca, the children of the sun, get so much attention in South America, but they were only around for a relatively short period, a few hundred years at most. Where as the civilization of Tiwanco lasted for thousands. They have left little behind except for some freaky cone-head skulls. I usually lament walking around the museums at these sights because there is only so many fragments of pottery one can stand, but the Tiwanco people were funky, having groovy bowls and buckets carved like little dog/god creatures. It was very cool.
I've passed the witches market on a number of occasions, either to buy crap of passing through en route to the sheesha cafe. They sell little idols and icons and coca leaves and llama fetuses. That's right, llama fetuses. Apparently they bury them at the construction of a new house.
Conspiracy theory John and I travelled up to the Mirador to snap a nice pic of the city. It was quite the little adventure for us two children of the first world delving into the back streets of the favellas. We found a small overpass and set up camp for the sunset. We had a group of little kids come sit with us, intrigued with what we're doing. We made small talk - the kind where we don't speak any Spanish and they don't speak any English. But we still managed to have fun translating their names into English.
Today Tess capped my La Paz story off with a trip to the moon, Luna Park, not the carnival, but a moonlike geological landscape with weird ass moon things, moonlikeing along the moontype moonstuffs. So moon moon and... well just look at the photos.
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