My Journey Round The World

Perrine & Sylvain left the next day and I decided to visit the Valle de la Luna. After a bbq party in the hostel I met a friendly Australian guy - Nicholas – with whom I spent the day before he left for Cusco and Colombia. No wonder why the Valle de la Luna have is name… You really feel on the Moon… Only surrounded by mountains makes it a bit unrealistic for the moon! It was really hot and we could see some nice cactus there! After catching a bus back to the city – much easier than on the way there, where we had to find a minibus in the middle of the street, quite funny! – we went at the Mercado for lunch and tasted divers types of food: soup, fish, fruits salad – excellent! Except maybe the vitamins juice we took… In the evening we had a really nice dinner in a supposed bolivian-french restaurant – La Comedie - which was a bit more french than bolivian… and it was really good!

La Paz… Incredible city!!! Highest administrative capital of the world – or use to be as on the Constitution, Sucre is the one, which a Bolivian confirmed on the Minibus to La Paz - built between 3200 and 4000 metres in a huge canyon. Really impressive to see all this urbanisation surrounded by snowcap mountains… This is the only city on earth where you have to go up in order to find the slum! 2 350 000 people including El Alto – the slum area which dominate the city. As all big city, it’s really noisy and quite dirty as well but it’s still interesting to see how people are living in such a high city! Still have tiny streets where bus drives! Really nice markets where you can eat for nothing, fresh fruits juice on nearly every corner… Little shops on the street where you can find anything & everything from toilet paper to shampoo, underwear to pyjamas, batteries to lock… Thousand of people walking day and night in the city… Impressive!

I arrived there with Perrine & Sylvain under heavy rain! First thing we did was to catch a taxi as soon as possible to reach one of the hostel we found on our guide book and ended up in The Adventure Brew Hostel – www.theadventurebrewhostel.com - including a microbrewery and a lovely terrace surrounding one part of the city.

In the afternoon, we went to visit the Coca Museum – www.cocamuseum.com – where we spent more than 2 hours, learning about the benefits of this little leaf (I’m sure we learned more than on Wikipedia… Perrine will understand!). In the evening, we went to a traditional Peña where we could see traditional dances and ear traditional music while having diner – not the best of the trip! On the next day, we walked around the city and especialy Mercado de las Brujas, where we met Julie & Thibault (with whom we had this nice picnic in Copacabana) for lunch. 

As we couldn’t make it to La Isla del Sol on Sunday, Perrine & Sylvain decided to move on to the next day in order to hike a bit. When I saw the glacier picture, I was really excited to go there too! Plus hiking on my own wasn’t really easy, so I followed them in this small town surrounded by green mountains – especialy the snowcapped peak of Illampu (6 362m) & Ancohuma (6427m) and at the confluence of the Rios San Cristobal and Challa Suya.

Our first day was a bit short as after crossing by boat the Titicaca Lake – we had to go out of our bus which took another boat to cross the lake, quite a fun experience! – we missed our stop as the driver didn’t say anything to us & we ended up in La Paz… We had to catch a minibus, doing half of the way back,  on a really busy road to go to Sorata… A bit dangerous I would say! But we managed to arrive all in one peace – the road at the end was really bad and driver not really safe one!

We found a lovely hotel at the end of endless  steps. After a good sleep on, we had a big brekfast in the small city center & headed to the Gruta San Pedro under the rain… On our way, we met a group of 5 people: 2 Belgium, 1 French, 1 German & 1 Spanish – with whom we visited the cave. Lots of fun by walking in this warm environement as well as having a small boat trip inside!

On the way back they decided to walk on the Riverside… They ended up sleeping there as it was dark & they could’nt find their way back !

Next day we hiked up to the Laguna Chillata at 4200m – 1500m uneven – a bit too much for me… Luckily it wasn’t raining and Perrine & Sylvain waited for me quite often! I have to say that I was missing my sticks & my back up Gregoire… Anyway I finally managed to get to the cloudy lake!… We quickly had our lunch as it was pretty cold up there and went back down. On the way, as the weather was pretty good, we let go our guide Justinio & had a small nap with a wonderful view on the valley! I finished the way down with some rain…

Copacabana… Not the best city I ever saw, even if the cathedral is quite a monument – renovated for Jean-Paul II visit’ in 1988, also interesting is the small room with candles on the left side of it. Walls are totally black because of the candles smoke and full of drawing – wishing from people , and ok, the view of the Lake Titicaca from the hill El Calvario – 4 000 metres high! – is absolutly amasing for the sunset… My plan was to go to la Isla del Sol… Unfortunately that Sunday it was the Bolivian President election, nothing was allowed to move, bar and shop waren’t allowed to sell alcool… So nothing moved from the all day, regarding alcool it was another story!…

We were all stuck in this little paradise where I ended up with 3 friendly french couples (Perrine & Sylvain, Julie & Thibault, Anne-Laure & Jean-Francois). As we could’nt really do anything, we decided to have a big picnic with local products – avocado, bread, cheese, water melon, mangos, Bolivian Wine… in front of the Titicaca Lake! We finally had a great afternoon!!!

Well arrived in Bolivia! Lucky me I managed to get a 90 days stamp instead of 30 on my passport.

Today president election in Bolivia… Nothing was moving… Absolutely nothing… I was supposed to visit la Isla des Sol, well, we were all ready on time but stayed at Copacabana with no way of escaping this little town! Luckily it was sunny, I met 3 French couples & guess what… We had a big picnic on Lake Titicaca border, with Bolivian wine, cheese, guacamole homemade by ourselves… Nice afternoon! Let see what will happen tomorrow…

Thanks for your messages! I loved to read it

With Gregoire we’ve also visited Chinchero – known as the birthplace of the rainbow, Cusco flag (Ariane you would have love that, you left too early!) a tipical Andean village – sorry no picture I forgot my camera that day! – after Ariane left us.

Cusco is a pretty city and I really enjoyed resting there after this intensive Inka Trail as well as this more than 80 days travel for now… I had a lovely backpacker hostel – Pirwa http://www.pirwahostelscusco.com/ – with really friendly staff – compare to the more high class hotel we had for this 2 weeks except in Arequipa –   in the lovely San Blas district. I love the San Blas area with these narrow little streets full of stairs – again! – the huge Plaza de Armas, this so many restaurants where you can test many different food as well as great sweets and the peacefull atmosphere of the city even if it’s pretty touristy! While walking around yesterday, I even met a japanese women and her little girl in traditional japanese dress – funny to see the face of the locals in front of another traditonal clothe, so unusual for them I would guess… I also cross a manifestation on the Plaza de Armas – for clean water if I get it well??… – really interesting to see natives with their local clothes mix with people dressing in a more occidental way! Pity I didn’t have my camera again!

Last lunch in a lovely restaurant with a test of 3 different potatoes – ok over 3 000 different species, it’s not much but still before heading to Bolivia – Copacabana tonight

 

WE DID IT!!! I’m so glad After such a long and quite difficult trek, we had 2 hours guided tour on the ruins and then free time We could have climb more… But I have to say that after this 4 days walk and the cloudy weather, I didn’t really feel like hiking more than necessary. Our guide recommended us to go to see the Inka bridge… Well, really interesting… wooden bridge… More than 15mn walk announced for a… wooden bridge… Scenic wasn’t as nice as the Machu Pichu site especially because of a factory and electricity pole in the valley but ok, we made it and came back with the rain… again… but we were use to it now

I have to say that since this trek – which was a kind of test, as yes, I take that as a physical as well as a mental test, which I wasn’t really expecting before! – I’m feeling pretty good, more quiet – well not when internet isn’t working properly! , serene… Somehow mentally free, as someone said to me… I don’t really know if this is because of:

• the trek,
• my friends around for 2 weeks,
• the rest I just had in Cusco,
• my travel since more than 80 days now…

I guess this is a combination of all and it’s absolutly a pleasant feeling! I’m really happy for choosing this way at this time of my life! The only thing I’m missing a bit is you… Knowing how you are, what’s happening in your life… I’ll be glad to have more news from you :)