Bolivia

So having headed back to Argentina, to Mendoza on a beautifully long bus ride, we arrived on Easter weekend with no hostel booked. Clever, I know. After desperately walking about for about an hour we finally found room at a hostel, paying an extortionate price for one bed and one mattress on the floor, but beggars can't be choosers! Bee arrived back fresh from the snow in Canada, exhausted from such a long flight with various stopovers, but all very happy to be reunited. To celebrate Easter Sunday, Elle and I went to the local church for morning service (which was surprisingly empty for a country supposedly 80% catholic) then had an egg hunt with some friends- some hidden 'hilariously' in the pool....oh the waste of chocolate!
We just had time to cycle around some vineyards and taste some of the famous Argentinian wines, and have an all-important last steak before an emotional final farewell to Elle on her bus back to Buenos Aires in time for her flight home. Back to the orginial twosome!
With heavy hearts we left Argentina and somehow caught a bus all the way to the border with Bolivia, La Quiaca. The border was little more than a hut and a man with a stamp- easy to see how so much can be smuggled across- not that we got any ideas of course. It was interesting to see how the facial features of people changed so dramatically with broader cheek bones, darker skin, squarer jaws and oval eyes. Also the sight of women in multiple pleated colourful skirts, with beautiful embroidered blouses, two long thick black plaits down their backs, all topped off with a bowler hat! We stopped over in Tupiza for a night, a place famed for its red rock views and horseriding, feeling very much like something out of an old western film. Continuing on to Uyuni, we were ready for our Salt Flats tour.
It is impossible to describe in words the landscapes we saw on the three day tour, they simply could never do them justice. We saw miles of blinding white flat salt fields, lagoons filled with flamingos, baked red rock, craggy mountains and volcanoes, geysers, hot springs, and delicate flakes of snow at 4000m. It was absoutely breathtaking!
Arriving back to Uyuni that afternoon, we hopped straight on a bus to Sucre, arriving at 4am and sleeping on lovely comfortable plastic seats. Proactive as ever, we headed straight to the market in the hilltop village of Tarabuco- stunning scenery on the 2 hour bus ride there with low-lying clouds and green hills. There was an abundance of bolivian textiles and handmade goods- llama jumpers, armadillo-backed guitars, cocoa leaves (very important here) and piles of fruit and vegetables- considering that Bolivia has over 5000 different varieties of potato, you can imagine the colour and variety of the market! Sucre itself has some of the most beautiful architecture we have seen, with white colonial buildings everywhere that are absolutely dazzling in the sun- great sketching opportunities too. The cemetery was also beautiful, not on the scale of the Recoleta cemetery in Buenos Aires and definitely not as imposing, but it had rows and rows of white walls with windows filled with flowers which are changed regularly- large tubs of wilting flowers and petals where everywhere, giving a lovely perfume to the air.
Next stop was Cochabamba- itself quite a busy bustling grimy city- but has the largest most extensive market we had ever seen! We got lost in the meat section alone for about an hour, surrounded by large sections of skin hanging up, sheep heads, tongues, feet and lumps of steak with flies buzzing and the smell of flesh hanging heavily in the air. Only here would you find rows and rows of shoes for sale right next to the meat, or mattresses and cupboards next to enormous papayas and apples and juice bars side by side with television sets. Unsurprisingly we did get caught up in the heady commercial buzz of the market, investing in some DVDs, shoes, jewellery and some jumpers for the cold weather (apparently lots of the american clothes for sale here have been donated for people in need, but are brought over to Bolivia and then promptly bought wholesale and resold in the markets).
We spent the next few days in La Paz, another crowded metropolis with crazy nightlife, having met up again with some friends from Sucre. The Witches Market after the market in Cochabamba was much less impressive and seemed very stagey for the tourists- although we will never get used to the sight of llama foetuses hanging up everywhere! Foodwise we have been feasting on plenty of empanadas (or techincally 'saltenas' for the savoury fillings) and had our fair share of llama steaks and alpaca steaks- deciding that of the two, alpaca is much juicier and flavoursome. We actually saw one woman on a bus carrying a baby llama on her back in a colourful manta as if it was the most ordinary thing in the world! Felt a slight stab of guilt when tucking in to the next steak we had....
After the business and non-stop rush of La Paz, we retreated to the northern side of Lake Titicaca, to Sorata, a small village perched on the side of a valley among the mountains, reached in a few hours in a cramped little minivan, with our huge packs strapped precariously to the top. Sorata has probably one of the most beautiful landscapes we have ever seen, with a river cutting through the middle of enormous hills on either side, lush with jungle. We set off on a hike without any proper directions, and found a mountain trail in the undergrowth, climbing high up and winding along by the river, finding some caves on the way. The scenery was absolutely stunning, so despite a slightly scary wade in the river, having to scramble on all fours up a side-stream to get out of the very strong current, climbing up the wrong side of the valley only to be rescued by a Bolivian heading to Sorata himself who took us all the way back down and back up again, it was so much fun- especially feeling like intrepid explorers. We earned ourselves a good hearty meal- chicken soup and then a huge bowl of rice, potatoes, vegetables and chicken- and all this for 10 bolivianos, about 90p!