Bolivia, I love you! From when we arrived to when we crossed into Chile you have constantly surprised me. La Paz was fantastic. We arrived at the highest capital city in the world by bus on a motorway which skirted the top of the mountain bowl that contains the city giving us a great first view of our playground for the next week. Our first night there we went to see La Paz FC play Blooming in the Hexagon Final of their season. La Paz came from behind to win 2-1 near the death and as the riot police escorted the referees off the pitch the local supporters club was still singing, dancing, letting off fireworks and generally having a great time. Okay, so the standard of footy wasn´t up to the heights of Newcastle United but you can´t fault the atmosphere. We later found out that La Paz lost their next and last game of the season, thus losing the cup.

We took in as much of La Paz as we could. We visited the San Francisco Monastry and were allowed to get some great views of the city from walking on the roof of the chapel. We passed through the witches market and saw llama pheotuses being sold next to KH3 (synthetic cocaine) and we became familiar with delicious street food such as empanadas (deep fried pastry pockets of cheese or meat), salchipapas (fried potatoes and slices of fried sausage with salsa, mustard and mayo) and saltenias (baked pasties crammed with meat or spicy chicken) all of which were delicious. We hurtled down the Most Dangerous Road in the World on mountain bikes, marvelling and being strangly drawn to the 600ft sheer drops wizzing by on our left side. We sampled all local beers (Pacena being the best) and even had a bath in some (Saya Beer Spa) and before we left we went to Chollita Wrestling.

Move over WWF there is a new group of grown men and women who dress up in silly clothes and wear masks who like throwing each other around a ring. It was certainly great theatre, with goodies and baddies, bent refs, heroes and villains. All wearing indecent amounts of lycra. The highlight for me was a match between a Quechua woman (fake) and a punk (faker) who both had dwarves in attendance with them. I have film of the dwarves going at it. Very funny indeed.

The only dissappointing thing from La Paz was not being able to find anywhere that was screening the Ricky Hatton v Floyd Mayweather fight. We ended up in a british pub trying to watch it on a chinese feed over the barmans laptop. We saw a few freeze frames and then Floyd walking around the ring hands aloft. Still it was a really fun night which we paid for next day with hangovers made worse by the altitude.

So, via Oruro and Uyuni we now find ourselves in Chile. We were a little saddened to find out that the day after we left Oruro it decended in to the sort of political and social chaos that Bolivia is famous for after some districts decided to seek independance from central government. We missed all the rioting and excitement. But by then we were in Uyuni setting off in a 4x4 on a trip across the Salar de Uyuni. These awesome salt flats sit at 3653 metres above sea level and cover more than 12000 square kilometres. It is a vast dried ocean dotted with the occassional island. We visited one such cactus drenched island called Isla de Pescado (Fish Island) and marvelled at the strange and unique landscapes. After the salt flats we moved into vast desert and saw a gently smoking volcano and visited lakes where we saw flamingoes, vacunias (skinny llamas) and the bolivian rea as well as visiting strange caves and mummies tombs. Our final day on the trip before crossing in to Chile was spent visiting a field of geysers that looked like something of a hollywood directors vision of hell. Great holes in the desert were filled with what looked like violently boiling cement spewing steam and blanketting much of the surrounding area in eggy smelling sulphorous mist. After we had torn ourselves away from these we got to volanically heated hot springs (Termes de Polques). Laura and I were the only people in our group who got in, the rest were too scared of getting cold when they got out. They missed a treat. It was ideal bathing temperature and you could look out over the lake while you enjoyed the warmth. Fantastic, and after 2 days without a shower, very welcome.

From ther it was a visit to the mirror like Laguna Verde (Green Lake) to see a perfect reflection of the mountains above in the lake below. Then driving across the border in to San Pedro de Atacama in Chile. Unfortunatley I left my jacket and my headtorch in the 4x4 which is now back in Uyuni but that can´t stop me loving Bolivia.

Chris