Bolivia: Lake Titicaca and La Paz

Greetings from Bolivia! I'm writing this from Potosi, where we are 4060 meters high and freezing! But it's a fascinating town so it's been worth the dose of winter in June. Anyway, I'll tell you about the first leg of our time in Bolivia.

We left Cusco, with our companions from the Salkantay trek, and headed for Puno, on the Peruvian shores of Lake Titicaca. The bus ride was 8 hours, but nicely broken up with stops at touristy sites along the way - a crazily gilded colonial church, some pretty decent incan ruins, a delicious buffet lunch, a photo op on a high mountain pass (where I finally broke down and paid 1 nuevo sol to a traditionally dressed woman who let me hold her baby alpaca!), and an itsy-bitsy community museum. Note to South American tour companies- this is a really nice way to travel. Bus rides are so much more tolerable when you are made to get out and walk around for 30 minutes every hour or so.

I'm happy, but the alpaca in the middle is angry!

We found these nerds along the way to Puno.

Puno wasn´t much more than a stopover for us. We did walk around the town and down to the famous lake, which honestly was a little disappointing from the Puno shores. The next day we headed to Copacabana, a little town on the Bolivian side on the lake. The border crossing went smoothly, although as U.S. citizens we were the entertainment for the mostly European crowd on the bus, none of whom had to pay the $135 visa application fee that we did. (Bolivian president Evo Morales is not a fan of the States.)

Main plaza- Copacabana

Copacabana was a great base from which to explore the highest navigable lake in the world! It's a cute little town with stunning views of the lake, an impressive moorish Cathedral, and plenty of restaurants serving up the local specialty, trucha (trout, apparently easily mispronounced as a dirty word).

The view of Isla del Sol, from the slowest boat ever

We spent the night and then took the slowest boat in the world out to the Isla del Sol, an island on the lake where supposedly the first Incas AND the sun were born. This island was strikingly beautiful, especially after we climbed up hundreds of stairs with our backpacks on to arrive at our Hostal (not an easy feat at 3800 meters!). There was a major festival going on during our stay, so all the locals snuck off to dance and wear crazy costumes, leaving us tourists to fend for ourselves. Still, we managed to feed ourselves and the next morning took a fantastic hike to the north end of the island.

main street- Isla del Sol

another view of the Isla

We returned to the mainland and spent one more night in Copacabana before heading off to La Paz. At one point during this bus journey, everybody had to get off the bus so they could load it onto a ferry across the lake. We were loaded onto a separate boat and met the bus on the other side.

La Paz

The first sight of La Paz is pretty spectacular. It's the highest capital in the world but you arrive via the highest part, and then descend into the depths of the city which is in a valley. We shacked up at the Adventure Brew Hostel, which has a microbrewery attached (!) and ended up being a pretty great place to stay (unlimited pancake breakfast! free beer! nice people!).

typical intersection, chaos and lawlessness

La Paz is crazy. We really liked it but eventually tired of battling the insane drivers and super touristy areas. During our stay we visited the Coca musuem, which was a little run down but very interesting, and gave a great history of the importance of coca to both Bolivian culture and certain multinational corporations. We also took a Salteña making course! Salteñas are our new favorite snack- baked dumplings with a juicy filling of chicken or beef, along with potatoes, eggs, olives, and other goodies. Our two day course focused on the masa, or dough, the first day and the filling and assembly the second. We were the only non-bolivians in the class, so it was a great cultural experience (although the surly chef teaching the class couldn't really figure out why we were taking it). So, when we return home, we are well-trained to bake hundreds of these babies!

the Salteña seal- no easy trick

the finished product!