Climbing the Inca Steps:

Also, I’m living it up in Copacabana in a huge room all to myself with three beds and cable television and a decent breakfast and semi-warm water in the shower. I’m probably paying more for it than any other tourist in town, and it’s still only $11 a night. So that’s nice. But the combination of mucha lluvia and cable television (a Lost marathon!) is turning out to be pretty dangerous.

Edit, 5 hours later:
The sun appeared, if only for a couple of hours at midday. So I booked a night at Hosteria de Las Islas for tomorrow night, and trekked a bit around the South end of the island to look for Templo Pilcocaina, and got a little lost traipsing through tiny terraced potato fields before finding it. It was, and is, old. And ruiny. Tomorrow I’m coming back and doing the whole tour of the island, and may have more descriptive information to impart.

Wet Llamas:

Also, I got slightly hoodwinked today. Upon arriving on the island, I promptly headed to the shack advertising 4:00 departures back to Copacabana and bought a ticket back, just in case the Argentine hoardes might fill the boats up. When I arrived back at the dock at 3:30, I asked a few people which boat I was supposed to take, and they all told me that the company on my ticket didn’t actually have 4:00 departures back to Copacabana. And the shack at which I bought it was deserted. And my ticket conveniently didn’t have a time written on it. So I bought another ticket from an equally reputable-looking man sitting on a log. All in all, I was only duped for 20 Bolivianos, which is like three dollars. But still!

Reed Boat at El Puerto Turistico:

Edit, next day:
I came back to the island and took a proper tour with a little Aymara man and Cami and Elsa today. It was much more interesting on the North end of the island, and the weather was about a thousand times nicer, so I had a beautiful time. We saw the birthplace of the Inca god of the sun, and a little island solely populated by virgenes. And I got the worst sunburn of my South American adventure thus far because I was expecting more rain & so didn’t put on much sunblock. I look like a beet. With a peeling nose.

Hiking the Ridge of isla del Sol:

Edit, next day:
Sunburnt, rainy. Catching the ferry back to Copacabana and it seems like the Argentines have left Bolivia; my embarque is full of gringos from the Commonwealth who really like to talk. I’m a bit grumpy, though, as I didn’t bring enough money to the island to buy meals and water, so I’m anxious to get back to Copa to get some suspicious, delicious Bolivian food and refreshing industrial water.

Edit, next day:
Arrived back on the mainland and rejoined my French/British/Honduran compadres for an amazing, spicy and quaint Mexican meal and a walk up to the Virgin peak in town from which we saw an amazing sunset over the entire pueblito and had the opportunity to purchase myriad miniature cars, trucks, and what looked like Mr. Brady style 70s condominiums for blessing by the virgin. But I chose not to purchase any, and took photos instead:

I now find myself on the road to Puno with Cami and Elsa. My anxiety about the Peruvian border crossing turned out to be unfounded; I guess the $140 I paid in Uyuni for a visa was actually legit. The Colombian border may be a bit different. I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. So to speak.

And finally:
Bolivia is different. It’s the poorest country in South America, and you can tell. The people are incredibly nice and hospitable and soft spoken. And lodging, meals and sundries are cheap. The countryside is beautiful, and the buses haven’t been bad at all. But I have been taking turisticos (as opposed to publicos, which only cost maybe a dollar more), so that may be why I’ve been so comfortable.

Plus:
Peru is in a state of National emergency due to widespread flooding and mudslides. I saw on the television news this morning that hundreds of turistas are stranded in Aguas Calientes and hygenic conditions are deteriorating because so much infrastructure has been destroyed by flooded rivers and the storms. And Macchu Picchu is closed. So I may have to wait a little while to tackle that bit of adventure.

Your Intrepid Correspondent.

Muddy, downy:

Also, I went to see Evo Morales get inaugurated. We (Cami and Elsa and I, again!) took a collectivo to a little town called Tiahuanaco to see the informal, indigenous inauguration, which was fun, and odd, and just, well, great. And then the next day we were walking around town looking for a park when we stumbled across the stadium, and followed the crowds in. To the official inauguration ceremony. Where I listened to a whole lot of folkloric (it’s a word!) Bolivian music and danced a little bit and saw Rafael Delgado, Raul Castro, and Hugo Chavez speak. So I’m pretty much a socialist now.

That big white square is actually Evo on the screen:

Entonces, I went back inside, upstairs, to find the El Dorado window, handed the nice senorita my voucher, and was told that the voucher I’d bought was for tomorrow, not today. Blerg. I’d told the friendly woman at the tour agency earlier that I needed a ticket for the 7:00 to La Paz. She didn’t ask me, and I didn’t tell her, which day; I’d just assumed it was the same day as my purchase. So, here I was at the terminal with all my possessions in the world, a ticket for the wrong day, no hostel booked for the night in Sucre, and a pretty desperate look on my face. I asked the senorita at the terminal if it was possible to change my ticket for the later bus, but she showed me on the screen that every seat in both the 7:00 and 7:30 bus was filled, and I was pretty much out of luck.

Except. Five minutes of me trying to look as pitiful, yet friendly and gracious as possible, later, she had an idea. Apparently there’s a semi-truck-style bunk behind the driver’s seat in some of these buses where the co-pilot can catch some zeds during the trip. Senorita actually had a picture of one on her computer to show me, and, of course I said I’d take it at no extra charge.

So I retrieve my mochila from the dangerous descending hook manned by two 9-year-olds, toss it into the bus, and settle into the seat next to the driver (offered to me by one of the co-pilots). It was fun, and a bit scary, to see the road from this perspective. Sometimes it seems like bus drivers in South America are a bit reckless, even from the comfort of a reclining seat in the back of the bus, but you don’t really know how reckless they are until you’re sitting next to one and watching as they careen through tiny streets at top speed and barely avoid killing pedestrians and domestic animals while joking around and gesturing wildly with their (multiple) co-pilots and buddies and the little Chola woman seated at my feet. And about a half an hour into the 12-hour trip, they busted out the 96% alcohol, which made me a little apprehensive. But, to their credit, all it was used for was to give a few drops to Pachamama out the window, and to bless the steering wheel with an alcohol baptism of sorts. And the driver crossed himself with it maybe a dozen times.

A bit later one of the co-pilots asked me if I wanted to retire to the cabin. So I climbed back there over another guy and found the bunk a bit small (my feet stuck off the end about a foot and a half), a bit stinky, and a bit claustrophoby, but a decent way to pass a night. It was a space about 3 feet wide, five feet long, and two feet high, with a blacked out window and a blanket with a picture of (I think) a sweet wolf on it. So I turned my iPod on and prepared for a boring, dark, stinky night alone. Until a stop in the middle of nowhere at which I got out to stretch my legs and came back to find a bedmate.

It’s two in the morning. You’ve been sleeping for a couple hours in a small dark box, being thrown around by a superstitious (maybe drunk) driver’s erratic driving, listening to cumbia antigua, and smelling a scratchy wolf blanket that you’re using as a pillow. You’re woken up, you stand outside for three minutes, and you go back to your little box to find another guy in there. What do you do?

You know what I do? I climb back in. I spoon. I sleep like a baby. And I arrive in La Paz still comfortable with my sexuality.

La Paz Terminal:

Outside the Miners’ Market:

I’m in Sucre now, staying at a posh hostel called La Dolce Vita, and let me tell you, it really is the sweet life. It’s run by another very kind French couple, and Rich (Australian) and I are sharing a huge room with real beds and two bathrooms right outside the door, one with a shower with hot water all the time and both with free toilet paper.

The Sweet Life:

We went to the indigenous weavers museum yesterday, which was interesting, but felt like walking through an anthropology major’s thesis. And it made going to the crazy village market today much more interesting because we knew what the different weaves and hats and whatnot meant.

I’ve been hanging out with the aforementioned Rich and a couple of nice girls, Camille and Elsa for a while now. We’re all heading our separate ways tomorrow, which is a bit sad, frankly, as it makes traveling much easier and oftentimes more fun when you’ve got a group to hang out with all the time. But, c’est la vie, non?

I’m headed for La Paz tomorrow night, arriving the next evening and staying at Loki Hostel (of course). Then, bike-death-road.

Also,

I watched most of Sexo en Nuevo York today.

In Confidence,

Yours Truly

P.S. Sorry about the lack of pictures. Wifi evidently doesn’t exist in Southern Bolivia. I’ve got some great ones, though. Just be patient, ok?

Buenissimo:

Adrian drove us through sand and rock past extravagently colored lakes, past bizarro rock formations, past flamencoes and salt flats to our refugio in the middle of absolutely nowhere, at which we would spend our first night. We (Cami, Elsa, Rich, and Yours Truly in our truck, and five others from the other) ate a delicious meal, played some pretty enthusiastic cards (Egyptian War), and tried to go to sleep early, but most of us couldn’t sleep at all, thanks to the stupid high altitude.

And the next morning we woke up to see the sun rise over the mountains, which was pretty, and early, and tired. We drove a long, long way to see some more pretty lagunas and flamencoes, and tried to comfort Elsa, who was terribly sick from the altitude. And we joked around, and tried to fall asleep in the Land Cruiser and got out every hour or so to take photos and stretch our legs. Until about 6:00, when we arrived at the Salt Hotel, which is a hotel made of salt. I tasted it, and yes, it was salty. We played cards and drank warm beer and attempted to discuss Chilean and world politics and fell asleep very early, as is my custom now.

Again, the next day, we woke up at 4:30 to see the sun rise over the salt flats which were covered with a very thin layer of water (as it’s the rainy season), and it was magnificent, and gorgeous, and quiet, and fun, and oh, so pretty.

Most of our party (two trucks) was French, and they were all very kind and worldly people. And I’ve learned a lot of French.

Also,

In San Pedro de Atacama, I went with Rich (Australian) to see the geysers (which he calls geezers, hilarious!) at, again, 4:30 in the morning. And they were also very cool. Lots of hot spurty water and stinky thermal baths (into which I took the plunge) and bubbly bits. And Brazilians, maybe a thousand of them.

Finally,

I’m in Potosi right now, which is a pretty sizable (especially compared to Uyuni) city in Bolivia that was made prosperous by silver mines in previous centuries. I got a bit sick recently, I think from a combination of the altitude and dehydration, but am feeling almost top-notch today, and will thus be venturing into the dark and smoky (and some say scary) mines tomorrow, where I may buy some dynamite.