Monday 11 November 2013

Lake Titicaca, La Paz and our experience in a hospital in Bolivia

We slipped quietly into Bolivia through the border town of Yungoyo beside Lake Tititicaca  using local transport. The local buses and mini vans are cheap, go all the time and they will stop for anyone who waves them down on the side of the road. Although sometimes the driver gets a bit carried away and crams too many people in and everyone complains.

It took just a few minutes to get through immigration as we were the only foreigners going through the border here. We arrived in Copacabana just in time to catch the boat to the Isla de Sol (Sun Island). This is another place the Inca empire built temples. On arrival at the island we were greeted by a steep climb up a staircase built by the Inca´s up to the village of Yamani which sits on the side and top of  the hill. Sue who has had two new hips last year and earlier this year did a great job struggling up the stairs which was made even more difficult by the fact that we were at 4000m above sea level.

While there is farming on the island, Yamani seems to exist solely for tourism. The town consisted of hostels, restaurants and a few little convenience stores. It was very eerie though because there were hardly any tourists when we visited so it was very quiet apart from a few locals, donkeys and llamas wondering around. Once it got dark we had to use our head torches to get back to our hostel through the cobbled streets as there were barely any street lamps.

Isla del Sol

The next morning I set off early (it was hard to get up because of the altitude) to walk to the northern end of the island to visit the Inca ruins. The weather was overcast but by 9am the rain had well and truly set in. Concerned that Sue would be stuck  with all our luggage in the rain I returned to our hostel to find her still in bed at 9.50am! I gave her 10 minutes to get up and be ready so that we could catch the 10.30am boat back to the mainland as there was nothing else to do on island in the pouring rain and time is short.

La Paz

After leaving Isla de Sol we travelled to La Paz. This time we spent three days here. I wanted to climb Mt Huayna Potosi but was not able to because there has been too much snow and rain. So instead Sue and I visited the Valle de la Luna (Moon Valley) with its strange rock formations of clay and pebbles created by erosion.

Valle de la Luna

 I also went on a walk to Muela del Diablo (Devil's Molar) which is just outside La Paz. From here I could really get an appreciation of the strange landscape in the valley in which La Paz is built which was only spoilt by the graffiti and rubbish in the rock face.The guide book had advised against doing the walk on my own saying it was potentially dangerous. And it turned out to be true! The problem was not however people but the dogs -one of which bit me. Not only was it very painful for over a week but the dog made two holes in the only pair of long pants that I have with me.

Muela del Diablo
Views from Muela del Diablo
Witches Market, La Paz

These zebras stop the traffic to allow pedestrians to cross safely

During our stay in La Paz Sue just wanted to sleep all the time and complained of having a very sore neck. She seemed to be struggling with the altitude a bit but we thought the neck pain was just muscular. This pain became excruciating during a fourteen hour bus journey to Sucre. Made worse by the fact that we paid double to have nice comfortable seats and a toilet. Only in Bolivia we have discovered that even when there is a toilet on board it never works. We had to ask the bus driver to stop and go behind a truck beside the main road!!

Once we got to Sucre Sue and I were directed to the hospital to see a Doctor. What we thought would be a short visit to the Doctor turned out to be a four day stay in the hospital. Sue was admitted with very high blood pressure caused by being at high altitude. There was only one Doctor in the hospital who spoke some English so it was a big challenge to understand what was going on. I would like to say my Spanish has greatly improved but it was severely inadequate to the task.

Sucre has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage site because of its many well preserved 16th century buildings built by the Spanish. However I can´t say I really got to appreciate its charms. I spent the best part of five days visiting my Mum in hospital, dealing with the hospital and insurance bureaucracies and an Internet infrastructure that is so slow it is like using dial-up. I could not even send photos of the medical certificate that the insurance company was demanding. It certainly starkly reveals the difference between living in a rich country like NZ and a poor country like Bolivia.

At the hospital you have to pay for everything before you receive any treatment and that is the same for the locals too. Everytime I turned up to visit my Mum I would be handed a prescription to go and buy more drugs at the pharmacy. While I did see some computers in the hospital they seemed to be reserved for administration staff.  The nurses had to use typewriters. To get the medical certificate I had to go to another place and pay for a blank form with the letterhead. I then had to return this form to the hospital to have it typed and signed. I had to pay more money to have this done and the process took two days. After all that effort the cost of Sue´s stay in the hospital was so cheap it did not exceed her excess and the insurance company refused to pay the cost for her to return home early as she had wanted.

One thing that was not so different was that the senior Doctors were just as rude and arrogant as many (usually surgeons) often are back home. On the positive side they do know how to treat people for altitude sickness here.

Once Sue was released from hospital and I had the medical certificate in hand we flew to Santa Cruz on the recommendation of the Doctors. As we needed to get my Mother down to a lower altitude for her to fully recover. Santa Cruz is at 400m while Sucre is at 2800m. This was way off our course but necessary. Santa Cruz is very hot which was a shock after being at much cooler temperatures and having to wear our thermals for most of the trip. But other than nice balmy weather and a pretty central square Santa Cruz has has nothing to recommend it - it´s just another big, noisy, polluted,expensive and run down city. We were very surprised to came across the Kiwi Restaurant here which was set up by a young Bolivian-American guy who fell in love with NZ. He has since sold the restaurant but it still has a ¨"kiwi" menu and a very nice large traditional mural on the wall alongide pictures of couples dancing the tango.

Once the insurance company turned town Sue´s request to return home early she decided she would pay to go home anyway. The afternoon before she was due to fly out we got an email from the travel agent saying that when she had tried to pay for the booking it disappeared and that flight was now full. Sue was really upset about this. I suggested that she continue travelling with me so we wrote to the travel agent to say that Sue was looking at her options and could she confirm that Sue´s original bookings were still okay. Well you can imagine my shock the next morning when I opened my email the next morning at 8.30am with half a dozen urgent emails from the travel agent saying that my Mum was booked on a 7.20am flight that morning.

concert of traditional dances from around the country. A mix of Spanish and African influences in the dances which were very energetic. The costumes were gorgeous.








Friday 1 November 2013

Goodbye to Cusco, Peru

Sadly after spending three weeks here at a Spanish language school (ECLA) we had to say goodbye and recommence our travels back to Bolivia and then down to Argentina. Cusco is a great place to explore the history of the Inca empire. It was also great to stop in one place for a while to relax and meet other travellers. Although trying to learn Spanish is hard work and I have to say  that while my Spanish has improved it is still pretty basic

Here are some photos from our visit to Cusco:


Cathedral in the Plaza de Armas - The central square. Every town has one here

View of the Plaza de Armas

Stone work built by the Inca's. These structures do not use mortar and are so well built they have survived earthquakes. The Spanish destroyed many of the buildings built by the Inca's or used them as a foundation to build on as is shown here.

Close up of the stones cut by the Inca's and fitted together perfectly without mortar.

Street scene

Concert of traditional music and dance. The costumes were amazing.

Learning to Salsa dance. Even Sue came along to some of the classes to learn. I also went to a spin class in Cusco which was even harder work than normal because at this altitude you have less oxygen to breathe.

Dogs roaming the streets in Cusco. They are everywhere and stepping in dog shit is a major  hazard!  Many don't even have owners but locals feed them so they look pretty healthy.
Apart from the tourist zones everywhere you go there is rubbish dumped on the side of the road  even in the countryside.

Isobel (our Peruvian Mother) and Sue. We stayed with Isobel and German in there house for three weeks while we went to a Spanish language school.  Isobel and German do not speak any English. We also had another room-mate, Mary who is a young student from North Carolina who was also in Cusco, studying Spanish.
Juliette (from UK), Priscilla ( from Los Angelos) and me celebrating our last night together in Cusco.  We met Juliette and  Priscilla at the Spanish language school.
There were quite a few vegetarian restaurants in Cusco being a tourist town and we tried as many as I could find.  Generally it is hard to find food without meat in it unless you like to eat a lot of pizza! Pasta and pizza are the most common foods at restaurants. However the delicacy here is Cuy  (guinea pig).