Bolivia Part I: La Paz and Isla del Sol

Today I venture into ground few husbands have dared enter. In all my browsing of family blogs, not once have a ever seen a post by the husband. I have seen husbands contribute to political or sports blogs, but a cute little couple blog? It is almost unheard of. Well, go ahead and call the blog police because I am about to shatter all the blog etiquette and rules.

Circumstances call for this etiquette lapse, because Jessica and I recently returned from perhaps our greatest adventure yet. As you will soon discover this adventure was extended beyond our plans which meant that Jessica missed two weeks of her master's program. Consequently, she is swamped with homework, which makes life boring for me the husband, which means its my turn to blog. So here it goes. . .

Our adventures began when Jessica called me one day and said
"hey Danny let's go to Bolivia next week"
I responded "Jessica, you are crazy, there is no way we can put a trip like that together in so little time"
She insisted "yeah, but I know we've been wanting to do it for so long, and I think this may be our last chance for years. Why don't you investigate to see if it is possible."
I said "okay, I'll see what I can do," and ten days later we boarded a plane headed to South America.

Our first stop was in Bolivia's capitol city La Paz. This is a crazy city, built in a canyon at 11,000 ft with 20,000 ft peaks rising above. The streets are narrow and steep and the buildings are literally stacked on top of each other up the sides of the canon. Ironically, since its inception, La Paz (the peace in english) has been torn by violence, protests, blockades and strikes. We got a taste of this right as we entered the city from the airport. Two days before we arrived in Bolivia, the Bolivian president raised the price of gasoline 80% (gas was heavily subsidized prior to this increase). This action outraged thousands and they took to the streets and stormed the city's main highway and torched and looted the main toll station. We took the picture below which shows the  burned out buildings and shattered windows. Interestingly, this event was featured in an article in The Economist, from which I extracted the picture below.

 

Our picture two days after the riot

Picture of the rioting action from The Economist

Open air market in front of our hotel

Crazy streets and building built up the slopes



Jessicanny in front of the presidential palace



A little cholita or Bolivian women from the country who still dresses traditionally

After spending some time in La Paz we ventured out to Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world at 12,500 ft. We first visited the city of Copacabana, which is Bolivia's holiest city. Thousands of people a year make pilgrimages to Copacabana to pray to "the virgin" of copacabana, to get their children baptized, or to bless their cars. The latter is quite the sight! 

Crossing the lake on a ferry

shoreline of Lake Titicaca



A recently blessed car





From Copacabana we took a boat out to the Isla Del Sol, the island of the sun. This is the Island where the Incan religion believes the sun god and first Incan emperor were born. The entire island is covered in Incan terraces and ruins. The one main town sits ontop a ridge in the middle of the island. From the boat dock, it is an hour hike up ancient Incan stairs to get to the town. There are no vehicles on the island, only llamas and donkeys. At over 13,000 ft elevation, Jessica and I got a little winded, but made it up to our hostal where we had some incredible views of the lake and of a lightning storm that night. The hostal wasn't exactly 5-star quality. Jessica was impressed that I killed 3 spiders and 6 flies upon entering the room. The toilets also took an hour to fill up. So Bolivian! The next morning we explored around the terraces and ruins before heading back to La Paz.

Jess hiking up the incan steps behind two bolivian women

Danny in the town of Yumani

We had to make way for the llama herds

View from our hostal

Double rainbow, oh my gosh, what does this mean?

La isla del arbol solitario