From Copacabana we headed south to the highest capital in the world, La Paz. The five-hour ride was pretty uneventful aside from when the entire bus inexplicably emptied (leaving us scrambling to put our shoes on and follow) and we boarded a speedboat and our bus took a ferry across a 500m stretch of water.

That’s our green bus (with all our belongings!) hopping onto a slow-moving raft.

We arrived in La Paz, settled into our hostel, and headed to the #1 rated pizza place in La Paz to enjoy an early dinner. It was amazing. We returned to Mozzarella Pizza several times.

Next day we went on the free-walking tour, version La Paz.

Francisco Church

Plaza Murillo, the main square that hosts the Legislative Palace, the Presidential Palace, and the Cathedral.

The Legislative Palace has the curious detail of a clock that runs backwards, the numerals reversed and the hands set to run counterclockwise. This is in an attempt to be different from the imperialists, to run left (opposed to “right” politically), to provide a more concise interpretation of the sundial (in the northern hemisphere the shadow of the dial runs clockwise, whereas in the the southern hemisphere the shadow runs counterclockwise), or for any other interpretations that steer thoughts away from conforming to the norm and help Bolivians rediscover their indigenous roots.

Llama fetuses and babies on the Witch’s Street. Especially on construction sites, these are offered to appease the Pachamama, Mother Earth.

Story-time about offerings to the Pachamama

At some point in our walk, Julien picked up a little food poisoning. This postponed his bike adventure on the Death Road from Tuesday, to Wednesday, to Thursday, until finally Friday he was feeling better and headed to Yungas Road, aka Death Road, Bolivia. Guided by Kieran and Eddi, Julien and a group of eleven flew down fifty kilometers of gravel cliff side road that used to handle two-way traffic until a newer road was put in place a few years ago. Vehicular traffic can still use this road, but today hoards of bicycler tour groups make up the majority. The trip was a bit pricey and of little interest to me, so I spent the day running errands around La Paz, including a multi-destination scavenger hunt from immigration office to cancelario to consulate to rectify my visa issue. I got to talk to the big boss of visas, a wonderfully no-nonsense woman, who described by five-year visa grant a “severa llamada de atención,” immediately printing off information-filled faxes that had been sent over a year previous, handing them to the Puno consulate boss (who just so happened to be in La Paz for a meeting) with stern instruction to notify all visa-granters of the unquestionable 10-year visa for U.S. Citizens and to post the notices all over the Puno office. Justice served. On my end, I have to get a real 10-year visa once back in Paris. And with that, I indulged in an activity I thoroughly enjoy and headed to a favorite La Paz coffee shop (shout out to The Writer’s Café!) and enjoyed coffee whilst not thinking about Julien hurlting down a road with “death” in its nickname.

Julien had a great adventure, and the photos of him were taken by the guides

The first section was on blacktop to get used to the bikes.

Here the cliff dropped over 2000 feet.

Click here for a bike ride down the Death Road.

The Yungas road winds along the mountainside.

Our bus following the group.

We could often see Eddi, one of the two guides, stretched out on the side of the road, taking photos.

Selfie with my $5000 bike.

Pooped after the five-hour ride

The view from our hostel

Our last night in La Paz we paused to capture the craziness of a roundabout on our way to Mozzarella Pizza