Here I am again to write about our very recent trip to the beautiful country of Bolivia. This country of awe inspiring natural beauty, studded with lakes, snow capped Andes, volcanos and national parks, is also famous for its delicious cuisine. One of the poorest nations in Latin America, Bolivia does remind me a lot of India in many ways.This trip was in June 2012 for a period of about 12 days. Our original aim was to just visit the famous Salar de Uyuni via San Pedro de Atacama in Chile but this wasnt enough to cover a good 10 days of a much needed break that we had promised ourselves. So after a little bit of research, a trip around Bolivia seemed an obvious conclusion ( and we werent really interested in doing another desert after the Thar in India).
La Paz was our main base camp, so to speak. At an altitude of about 4000 m above the sea level, La Paz is the highest capital in the world. If you are not too taken over by altitude sickness upon ariving at La Paz, a city bus tour is highly recommended. I wouldn`t claim that altitude sickness didn`t strike us. In fact the moment the aircraft doors were opened, I developed a headache and thinking was just too much work! This lasted for about 3 days but it wasn`t a spoiler at all. La Paz as a city is characterized by ' too many people breathing too few oxygen molecules.' We didn`t do a lot of touristy things in La Paz but I did find sometime to click this picture which is near the Presidential Palace.
After spending 2 nights in La Paz, we were off to Lago Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world. This lake is about 4 hours drive from La Paz thorugh Copacabana. Bordered by Peru in the north, Lago Titicaca is simply majestic. The shape of this lake apparantly resembles the head of a puma and hence the name Titicaca in the aymara language. Set in the middle of this lake is Isla del Sol which is of significant importance to the Incas. We spent a night at Isla del Sol although the climb from the ferry to the hostel was very tiring (yeah this too was above 4000 m). I could barely breathe and walk at the same time but the scenery on the right just blew whatever breath I had left in my lungs. Next morning, we were on our way back to the ferry when I clicked this (on the right). It was a beautiful morning, bright and sunny with the snow capped Andes bordering the blue waters of Titicaca. I didn't want to go back.
Back in La Paz and it was time to visit the famous Salar de Uyuni. We decided against the more adventurous 3 day Uyuni trip since living conditions are very basic in a 3 day trip to Uyuni. At altitudes of more than 5000 m and freezing cold, a 3 day trip to Uyuni wasn`t too appealing. So a day trip to Uyuni was finally what we set out for but as luck would have it, our bus arrived at Uyuni very late. We had to spend a night in the Uyuni village which I must add is in the middle of nowhere, however our accomodation was great! The Salar is one of its kind in the world and its the biggest of its kind. Its a fun place to take crazy photographs against the blinding wihite backgrounds ( sun screens and shades are an absolute must for all travellers to the Salar). We did have a lot of fun but honestly, after a point, there wasn`t much to do. Its just white all around unless you are there in the rainy season when those mirages form. We hope to cover the other parts of the Salar (not covered in the 1 day tour) in our trip to San Pedro de Atacama in Chile.
After spending 2 nights in La Paz, we were off to Lago Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world. This lake is about 4 hours drive from La Paz thorugh Copacabana. Bordered by Peru in the north, Lago Titicaca is simply majestic. The shape of this lake apparantly resembles the head of a puma and hence the name Titicaca in the aymara language. Set in the middle of this lake is Isla del Sol which is of significant importance to the Incas. We spent a night at Isla del Sol although the climb from the ferry to the hostel was very tiring (yeah this too was above 4000 m). I could barely breathe and walk at the same time but the scenery on the right just blew whatever breath I had left in my lungs. Next morning, we were on our way back to the ferry when I clicked this (on the right). It was a beautiful morning, bright and sunny with the snow capped Andes bordering the blue waters of Titicaca. I didn't want to go back.
Our next destination after a brief 2 nights stay in La Paz was Parque Nacional Sajama. We almost went to the Madidi National Park in north eastern Bolivia. Madidi is part of the Amazon rain forests and is one of the few places on earth with exceptional bio diversity. Somehow, we had developed a fancy for heights and freezing temperatures and so we decided that Sajama it would be. Sajama is the highest peak in Bolivia and is almost 6500 m. We stayed in a small village (again in the middle of noweher) called Tomarapi which was unbelievelaby close to Sajama. On our way to this tiny village, we met many curious looking Llamas but this one in the right
stole the show with its smile! We had never seen such a clear night sky before than what we saw in Tomarapi. That start studded night sky is something I should have captured in my camera but for the cold. We explored quite a bit around Tomarapi and Sajama village, had a good relaxing bath in one of the hot springs and while we were on our way back to the hostel, we came upon this beautiful lake around sun set. This is my favorite lake in the whole world (so far). They call it Huñacota.
We flew back to Santiago from La Paz and that was the end of a very good trip across Bolivia. The photographs pasted in this blog will not do justice to the beautiful landscape that Bolivia has. There is so much that we couldn`t see. We were quite sad to leave La Paz because in that short span of 12 days, we had almost gotten used to the life there, the mad chaotic traffic, the delicious food and ofcourse to their amazing language - Español.
We flew back to Santiago from La Paz and that was the end of a very good trip across Bolivia. The photographs pasted in this blog will not do justice to the beautiful landscape that Bolivia has. There is so much that we couldn`t see. We were quite sad to leave La Paz because in that short span of 12 days, we had almost gotten used to the life there, the mad chaotic traffic, the delicious food and ofcourse to their amazing language - Español.
