Day 4-5

First of all, I have to appologize for the lapses in updating this blog. Computers are hard to come by in Bolivia and good computers are even more rare! We´ve encountered a few problems, mainly from internet connection speed and reliability. I can´t tell you how many times computers have frozen as soon as I try to upload images (probably has a bit to do with the OS being microsoft as well). We will do our best, but bare with us.



So we finally encountered people!!! My family finally showed up and in a big way! We met with some of my cousins that have the alcohol tolerance of horses!!! (we evidently don´t). They had a party for us on Tuesday night then took us to a club. We have mixed feelings about this because it was one of the best times we´ve had in our lives and culminated with the worst hangover day we´ve ever had!!! Didn´t help that we also came down with some sort of stomach flu at the same time.



It´s one of my cousins birthday this saturday and in grand bolivian fashion, she is hosting a three day long celebration starting tonight. Brandy and I have run away to a city in the rainforest called Coroico (don´t think we can handle three days of binge drinking). I am now feeling better, but brandy is still having bouts of fever and nausea. This made the trip up here very interensting for us and all 700 other travelers who piled into a minivan to get here. This place is beautiful and we have the most amazing view from our hotel room. We are taking a tour of waterfalls tomorrow morning (that is if Brandy is feeling up to it).



We were supposed to be on our way to Peru, but my cousin convinced us to stay for her birthday celebration... we will be making our way back to La Paz either tomorrow night or Saturday morning. Should be interesting!

Just updated this post!!! Images have been added.

Day 3

I am now realizing the difficulty of trying to update this blog everyday without having my own computer!!! I Think we may try writing every 3 days. :)

Ok, so the first day in La Paz was pretty uneventful... We were pretty jet lagged and exhausted so we slept the rest of the day. As far as our first impression of Bolivia, it is like an entirely different planet!!! The city itself is positioned inside a sort of crater in the andes mountains. You see these multi-colored mountains on each side with extremely jagged cliffs. The city serves as a sharp contrast to the beauty of the mountains with it´s crumbling and decrepid homes. It´s hard to imagine how poor people are here without seeing it for yourself. On the other hand, we reached my family´s area in town and saw the polar opposite in wealth. Cleaner areas nice places, maids etc.

Brandy and I spent yesterday trying to take it easy and aclimate to the altitude... we feel like 90 year old asthma/COPD patients! (as you can see by the previous abreviations, brandy getting geeked with medical jargon). She is even having trouble breathing while sleeping! Altitude is around 1,200 feet at the lower points of the city and 1,500 feet at the higher points. We toured a bunch of the city yesterday. The city has progressed a great deal in the past 8 years since I´ve been here... they now have a dozen street lights, and only a few of them are manually operated by police officers! :) I´m proud to report we were booted from our first place yesterday! We were asked to leave this old church in the center of town after taking a picture of a guard who was sleeping on the job (should have turned off the flash). I´m going to blame brandy for this one! (whatever paulie ... you are the photographer .. by brandy)

One of Brandy´s highlights so far is probably having lunch with some relatives of mine. The whole family gets together every day from 12-2pm for lunch, where a three course meal is prepared by the maid. Don´t think she has ever experienced that. I know that it sucks that maids don´t make very much for all the work they do, but I have to admit... it´s really nice! In all, my family has been amazing!

Today we will tour around a bit more and prep for our trip tomorrow to Cuzco Peru. We will be taking a bus to a city on Lake Titicaca (the largest navigable lake in the world with the worlds funniest name!). From there we will catch a glorified bus (minivan) to another city on the border called Puno. And finally to Cuzco. We will try to write in a few days when we arrive in Cuzco.

Day before trip.

Thanks all for checking out this site.  We will try to update you with all adventures and pictures as often as we are able to find computers along the way.  We are pretty excited and knowing Brandy and I, reading along will probably be fairly entertaining with lots of the dumb stuff we tend to do. :)

Ok, here's the plan... we are flying out tomorrow morning and landing in Miami where we have a 9 hour layover.  Heading to South Beach and having some drinks while waiting.  Arriving in La Paz Bolivia on Sunday morning and hanging out for two days to acclimate to the altitude (being around 12,000 feet).  Taking off to Cuzco Peru and walking the inca trail to Machu Pichu.  Heading back to La Paz where we will spend a solid week seeing the city and doing over-night trips to surrounding areas.  Taking off to visit Salar de Uyuni (the worlds largest dried salt bed), Potosi (where the spaniards made the incas mine their silver) and Santa Cruz.  Then, back to La Paz where we await our return to the states.

That's it for now!  Have to finish packing.