Salt

There was no electricidad again. This time we were in the tiny dusty nothing town of Uyuni, ready to set off on our 4WD tour of the amazing Bolivian salt flats. We’d left La Paz the day before on the bus, travelling to a forgettable town called Oruro up on the top deck at the front. Our seats were panoramico, apparently, according to the woman who sold me the tickets. And we certainly had a…

Continue reading

The 1980s

In our room at the hostel in La Paz was an ancient tourist information book, called Discover Bolivia, or something like that. It claimed to have been published in 1991, but it also included helpful information about the country such as “the currency of Bolivia is the peso…” which hadn’t been true since 1986. In amongst the adverts for VCRs and other state of the art gizmos, I found this gem selling British Airways to…

Continue reading

How I Failed To Get Into Prison. And Other Stories…

After the peace and quiet of the island we returned to Copacabana to catch the bus to La Paz. All our other buses up to that point on the trip had been public buses mostly containing locals, but this time we’d somehow ended up on a bus entirely filled with fellow gringos. And even after being away in our own little world for just a short time, I’d almost forgotten that this continent is full…

Continue reading

Bolivia

“No hay electricidad”, said the guy from the guesthouse as we made our way to our room. This we knew, as we’d just finished eating our delicious Lake Titicaca trucha criola by candlelight. We didn’t mind so much, as it sort of added to the charm of being one of just a handful of tourists spending the night on the quiet Isla del Sol, but I imagine it’s rather annoying if you live there (and…

Continue reading

Just Fancy That…

Lonely Planet: South America on a Shoestring (10th Edition): pp864 (Peru Chapter): “Lake Titicaca: South America’s largest lake is also the world’s highest navigable lake…” pp205 (Bolivia Chapter): “Lake Titicaca is deservedly awash with gushing clichés. Although it is often wrongly described as the highest navigable lake in the world (both Peru and Chile have higher navigable bodies of water)…” Still, it could be worse, the Venezuela chapter (which is not one of the destinations…

Continue reading