On the 1st of June Margot arrived safely in Santa Cruz (Bolivia). Apart from some nice coffee places and typical restaurants around the main Plaza this city isn’t very much of a highlight. But before catching our flight to our next destination Sucre we at least had to try some of the traditional Bolivian dishes, such as sopa de mani (peanuts soup) and a typical dessert called ‘quiero mas’, which literally means ‘I want more’. So true, the caramel/milky pudding tasted great!
SUCRE – The white city of Sucre is the prettiest city of Bolivia, a real showpiece. It’s the birthplace of the nation, here independence was declared. Sucre is recognized in the constitution as the nation’s capital, whereas the seat of the government and treasury is based in La Paz. There is still tension between Sucre and La Paz about their powers. In the Freedom House we learned more about Bolivia’s history. Bolivia lost a lot of lives and land in many wars. Simon Bolivar is one of their great liberators. In the last notorious war with the Chileans, Bolivia lost access to the sea and a lot of land that was rich of minerals. Chile celebrates their victory on the Bolivians every year and this event recently resulted into riots in Valparaiso (Chile). Our guide explained that the hatred against Chileans is still fed nowadays in school and in the army. The Bolivian flag has 3 colours – red for blood, yellow/gold representing richness in minerals, green for mother earth ‘pachamama’ – and holds a symbol in the middle with 10 stars. They represent the 9 cities of Bolivia, the 10th star is for the land that now belongs to Chile, there’s still hope that one day they will get this back. Next to the official country flag most countries in this part of South America also have the colourful striped or blocked flag of the indigenous Quechua people of the Andes, representing the former Inca Empire.
We also visited the Dinosaur footprint wall in the Parque Cretacico, just outside the city centre of Sucre. It was discovered in the 90s on the terrain of a cement factory. Million years of sedimentation and ice ages compressed layers of earth into a vertical wall that through erosion now shows thousands clear footprints of dinosaurs on it. Seemingly the largest collection of dinosaur footprints in the world.
Inhabitants of Sucre with white painted houses pay less tax, so this is a great incentive for the population to keep the beautiful colonial style buildings perfectly whitewashed. We only spend 2 days in this picture perfect postcard city with little churches and museums, but for sure worth visiting.
UYUNI – After Sucre we continued our journey to the salt flats of Uyuni – the world’s largest salt flat of 10,582 square kilometres. It was very cold here – minus 15°C in the night/mornings – and some of our group didn’t sleep a lot due to the high altitude of 3600m+, but this was by far the most unique part of our Bolivian adventure! We took a 3 day jeep tour through amazingly diverse landscapes. Apart from the perfection of the salt flats, we saw a mysterious train cemetery, impressive rock formations, the Salvador Dali desert, the Tree Stone, volcanos, Cacti Island (Isla Incahuasi, some cacti were 9m+ high!), coloured lakes, flamingos, alpacas, llamas, bizcachas, impressive geyser fields (4900m altitude), slept in a hotel that was completely made out of salt and bathed in the best hot springs ever. What an experience…
LA PAZ – From the peaceful, quiet salt flats we travelled to the busy, chaotic La Paz. Quite different, but very authentic and again on very high altitude (3600m). So exploring this hilly city needs to be done slowly…we got already out of breath when we were just climbing up the stairs to the 2nd floor of the hostel to our room. An easy way to see this city from above is by taking the teleferico (cablecar). We visited the vibrant witches food market (Mercado de la Hechiceria). Wonderful to see all the women in the traditional colourful dresses, we wondered what the hell is under their skirts as they all seems so puffy…probably many layers of petticoat to protect against the cold on this high altitude…Once acclimatized we went on a little adventure and cycled down the ‘World’s most deadliest road’, 68km of downhill mountain biking. The road used to be the main access road to the north of Bolivia. Nowadays a new safe, paved road has been developed and the Death Road is now closed for traffic for obvious reasons. In the wet season the road can be very slippery and there is the risk of landslides. Some parts are always wet because San Juan waterfall runs across the middle of the road. As you can imagine a lot of accidents used to happen here, hence the name. Since there is no traffic anymore cycling down is fine as long as you don’t do any stupid things…the road is ~3m in the narrowest section. From our bikes we enjoyed the stunning views of Andes mountains as they slowly became greener when descending into the Amazon rainforest hills. In just a couple of hours we descended from 4900m to 1000m, what an adrenaline kick!
ISLA DEL SOL – Last stop in Bolivia for Viv & Margot was Lago Titicaca, the tallest high altitude lake in the world. Via Copacabana we took the ferry to the lovely Isla del Sol, which is completely free from motorized traffic. This was probably the worst travel day of our whole trip for Rene so far who was suffering from a nasty food poisoning…we were glad that we got to the island but didn’t realize we still had to climb up a crazy steep hill. As soon as we got to the ‘village’ we immediately took the first hostel we saw, happy to finally drop off our backpacks and wooow what a view, for sure the best view we had from our bedroom! The snowy peaks of the Andes mountain range in the back, sunlight sparkling over the quiet water of the lake, this is paradise! The island has ~2500 inhabitants, they live from farming, fishing and tourism and have to carry everything they import from the mainland to their homes from the port, on their backs or on the backs of their donkeys/mules (they can carry up to 80kg!). Men, women, old and young, all carry stuff up. Made us feel slightly bad since we were already struggling with our backpacks alone…The next morning we spend hours on the terrace where we had our breakfast just taking in the wonderful views. In Las Velas restaurant – a restaurant completely lit by candles – we enjoyed a remarkable dining experience. This restaurant is run by a former Gourmet chef, although the menu isn’t that special, the quality here was absolutely outstanding! The chef was preparing our delicious trout in the ‘open kitchen’, basically in the corner of the restaurant with his headlight on, while we were playing Yahtzee, truly exceptional dinner!
After Isla del Sol, Viv & Margot continued to Peru while Rene went back to La Paz for his climbing trip to the summit of Huayna Potosi.
PUNO – Viv & Margot stopped over in Puno (Peru) to visit the Islas Uros, also known as the floating islands. Our expectations were already lowered after speaking to some other travellers but this was quite a deception…it seemed to us that all 87 islands here were purely used for tourism purposes and no one was actually living here anymore. A big tourist trap, so glad we didn’t spend a full day here.
AREQUIPA – Next over to Arequipa, the 2nd city of Peru after Lima in terms of wealth and size (800k inhabitants). What we noticed on the way in the bus was that most houses don’t look finished, they all seem still under construction. Apparently this is done on purpose, as soon as a family has more money again, a new layer will be added onto the previous one. In Arequipa we visited the impressive monastery of Santa Catalina originating from 1570. 200 nuns + 300 servants used to live here, nowadays only 30 nuns are based here, who don’t show themselves to the public. It’s considered the most religious and prestigious building in Peru. From Arequipa we also took a day tour to Colca Canyon, this is the deepest canyon in the world and 120km long. Here the official beginning of the Amazone river was found. The highlight here was the Cruz del Condor, a beautiful viewpoint where we say many condors flying down in the deep valley. They nest in the deep Canyon of Colca where they use the thermal winds to fly, so they hardly need to use their wings. Condors are very big birds that can live 50/60 years, adults weigh 12-15kg on average and the span width of their wings can get up to 3.15m. They fly from here to the ocean and back in the same day for fish (400km total).
HUACACHINA – We travelled our way further west to Huacachina by night bus. Huacachina is a magical desert oasis surrounded by palm trees and giant sand dunes. The thrilling tour with the sand buggy and sand boards in the desert was fantastic!
PARACAS – Covering so much ground over the last 2 weeks so now it was time for a bit of relaxation at the Paracas coast where we enjoyed food and pisco till the max J We rented bikes to explore the national reserve on the peninsula, where desert landscapes touch the Pacific Ocean. And also the wildlife on the Islas Ballestas was worth the visit, little penguins, many lazy smelly sea lions, pelicans and countless birds!
The Peruvian kitchen definitely deserves a special mention. The food here is by far the best in South America we had: probably not the guinea pig (cavia) which is the local delicacy (Margot was brave enough to try it), but we love the delicious ceviche, huge selection of fresh fishes, scallops with parmesan cheese, pisco sours, alpaca meat etc.
LIMA – Lima was the last destination before Margot had to leave again L . The always cloudy and grey Lima is Peru’s capital, a very big city that holds ~30% of the total Peruvian population (10M+ inhabitants) and therefore the traffic is terribly congested. We stayed in Miraflores where the expat culture can be seen, from here we took the modern Metropolitana bus to the central plaza in the historic centre. Before saying goodbye again we enjoyed a brilliant last supper, one can never get enough of the Peruvian cuisine 😉 Thank you Margot for joining us, you had a look into our lives as travellers, hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!
LA PAZ – In the meanwhile, I (Rene) travelled to La Paz after Isla del Sol, to prepare for the Huayna Potosi climb. The problem was that I still suffered from the food poisoning so I was postponing the climbing trip each day. In total it took my body 8 days to recover again. All that time I was in La Paz, a beautiful and vibrant city. The hostel I was staying in (Archy’s) was a perfect family owned hostel, where I could also use the kitchen. Every day I was exploring a different part of La Paz, gathering my lunch/diner at all the little market stalls throughout the city. This felt like a very local experience, to stay a bit longer in one place and really get the feeling you live here. I also got a small project to work on, so I spent some hours behind the computer to work. Besides that I also had a personal project, to receive my package…
This is what we called the ‘Dell Hell’ before, my laptop screen broke some weeks ago, to make a long story short: No service from Dell (though I have international support), repairing here would take around a month and we didn’t want to stay that long in one place… So I decided then to order the laptop screen in the UK and let a friend send it to Bolivia. And again, shit service, this time from Parcelforce and FedEx. I had to discover myself that the package had arrived in La Paz (airport), but that it was locked by customs because I first had to pay all kinds of extra costs in order to take the package with me, I was not told about this before and if I knew it had been a better option to buy a new laptop in Bolivia. After a lot of calling and emailing, my broker (yes, you have to hire a company to guide you through the process of releasing the package…) said to me on one day that I could go to the airport to get the package. Yes! I left immediately. This took me all day, walking on the airport from the one office to another, in the end I had a document of 16 pages, had to give my signature about 15 times, in total paid around €150 (at 5 different desks), but I did it! I finally received the package! At the hostel I replaced the screen and everything worked again, yes!
HUAYNA POTOSI – After the 8 days in La Paz, I felt ready for Huayna Potosi. I took the 3 day option, where we got a training on the first day, a climb from base camp to high camp on the second day and the summit attempt and all the way down on the third day. It is divided over 3 days so we get a better acclimatisation, the height (top = 6088m) is the most challenging of this climb. On the first day I met Javier (Spain), Lukas (Slovakia) and Scott (UK), a very nice group of guys to climb this mountain with. We drove up to the basecamp (4700m) and a few hours later we start the ice climbing training. Very interesting to learn, you never know when you need it 😉
That evening we meet some other people, eat, drink and playing some games. The next morning we have to pack our backpack, it’s a lot: the heavy shoes, a lot of clothing for the cold, harnas, iceaxe, helmet, sleeping bag, etc… My big backpack is normally filled with everything I have, now it’s also full and about the same weight. The difference is, this time I have to carry it up to high camp… A very hard walk, but it only takes us a few hours.
At highcamp (5130m) we already have amazing views, we start preparing for the summit attempt which we will start that night at 1am. We don’t sleep much and wake up at midnight. It’s very cold and dark when we leave highcamp. I feel good, don’t have any problems with the height, except I’m continuously out of breath during the climbing. In the end I had to give everything I had, no more energy left when I reached the top… Wow, what a view, king of the world!
Now only down… 🙂 Because I had no energy left, this was really really hard, I walked down like a zombie. After an energy boost (gel/snickers) and descending a lot, I felt better and better. Still I was completely dead when I reached high camp again, after an hour, we had to walk to base camp with our fully packed backpacks again… This day I definitely found (and crossed) my limits!
The day after the return I left to Cusco via Copacabana to meet Viv again.
CUSCO – We’re now both in Cusco where we rented an apartment via our language school in the artist quarter San Blas. There is so much to do and see here…we’ll stay for the next 2 weeks at least. Even this won’t be enough to explore all the magnificent history and entire sacred valley.
Vivian and Rene in South America 
Jaaa!! Weer fantastische foto’s en een mooi verhaal! Ik geniet ervan en zo te zien en lezen jullie ook! Dikke knuffel van Carlijn
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Lieve Viv en Rene,
Wat een gave verhalen! Uiteraard had Marga al het een en ander toegelicht, wat het lezen eigenlijk alleen maar leuker maakt.
René, super knap! Kan niet wachten op alle ins en outs van die klim 🙂
Folks enjoy en relax!!
X susanne
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I seriously don’t like that “most dangerous road”… 🙂
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awesome pictures though otherwise!! looks like great fun!
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Een prachtig verhaal weer en gave foto’s! Pff wat een belevenissen daar in Zuid Amerika. Leuk dat Margot een maandje heeft meegereisd. Zal ook een onvergetelijke ervaring voor haar zijn. Geniet er nog van samen en tot de volgende update. X Thijs
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