As the more keen among you will have noticed, I am back on the road. As the even keener among you will have noticed, my plans to have "Toops fixed and back on the road as soon as possible" didn't really materialise. Or at least, the second half didn't - Toops is indeed fixed but after two weeks that involved having to have a new derailleur hanger sent from Spain at considerable cost. I should have probably come to La Paz straight from Uyuni to sort out the bike rather than have gone to Potosí and Sucre, but that's hindsight for you. The silver lining to all this, however, is that the last five weeks since leaving San Pedro have been great fun (fretting about bike parts notwithstanding) and it has been great to do the classic backpacker thing for a while. Obviously biking and backpacking aren't usually easy to do at the same time, and I probably wouldn't try again, but it has been a great experience and, now that I look back upon it, probably an itch that needed scratching.
However, the main upshot of my extended stay in La Paz is that I am now pressed for time to get to Cuzco, so my total cycling experience of Bolivia will be reduced to 3 days and I will be crossing the border to Peru tomorrow. Probably as a result of the time limit, I'm not as sorry to be leaving Bolivia as I was Chile or Argentina. The one thing I will miss, however, is hearing "ahorita" (right now) after every question asking when something opens, arrives or leaves. Predictably, it can mean anything from "in 5 minutes" to "next year" to "probably never", but almost never its original intended meaning. Frustrating at first, but eventually it got plain hilarous.
I will not miss the stale lard smell of coca leaf being chewed. Not so much in La Paz, but anywhere else in Bolivia that's at altitude it's difficult not to see someone selling it, stuffing it into the side of their mouth or simply letting it rest there and looking like cartoon characters do when they have toothache. Apparently it helps with the altitude and staves off hunger, so much so that the miners in Potosí get through their 12 hour shifts with nothing but that and the odd bottle of Coke or Fanta. And of course, the infamous Alcohol Potable, a 96% alcoholic content drink which is (sadly) ubiquitous in the poorest areas of Bolivia. Think I'll stick to my ham and cheese sandwiches for the bike thanks.
However, the main upshot of my extended stay in La Paz is that I am now pressed for time to get to Cuzco, so my total cycling experience of Bolivia will be reduced to 3 days and I will be crossing the border to Peru tomorrow. Probably as a result of the time limit, I'm not as sorry to be leaving Bolivia as I was Chile or Argentina. The one thing I will miss, however, is hearing "ahorita" (right now) after every question asking when something opens, arrives or leaves. Predictably, it can mean anything from "in 5 minutes" to "next year" to "probably never", but almost never its original intended meaning. Frustrating at first, but eventually it got plain hilarous.
I will not miss the stale lard smell of coca leaf being chewed. Not so much in La Paz, but anywhere else in Bolivia that's at altitude it's difficult not to see someone selling it, stuffing it into the side of their mouth or simply letting it rest there and looking like cartoon characters do when they have toothache. Apparently it helps with the altitude and staves off hunger, so much so that the miners in Potosí get through their 12 hour shifts with nothing but that and the odd bottle of Coke or Fanta. And of course, the infamous Alcohol Potable, a 96% alcoholic content drink which is (sadly) ubiquitous in the poorest areas of Bolivia. Think I'll stick to my ham and cheese sandwiches for the bike thanks.
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