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Got up reasonably early and had brekkie in the hostel, a lovely yoghurt and fruit! That may seem a bit odd me mentioning what I had to eat but I havent had yoghurt since I've been here plus I dont eat nearly enough fruit and veg here, hence the combination was lovely!
We headed out to the bus station to book our return bus tickets to Cusco, a nice walk albeit in some places full of traffic and fumes. We booked to com back on the 0800 bus the next day. Not my choice, I'd have liked to stay another day but Jess and Lily wanted to get back for Lily's birthday on Friday. We headed back to the hostel, picked up our cameras then me, Harry and Andy headed out to the witches market. It's a fab street just on past the stalls selling all the usual tourist stuff. It has a mixture of stalls selling talisman type figures, each symbolising good fortune for various things. I bought a couple of things. That's the one aspect of the stalls, the other is the dried corpses of various animals, llama foetuses, frogs, birds. Some would find this gross but I actually really likedit. From there Andy told us of a local market, we didnt have long but decided to head there anyway. We went up loads of great little streets and could have wandered there for hours. The market was more a clothes market, not the typical local market we were hoping for. We passed a tint stall when Harry noticed a hat hanging up. It was the stallholders own. Andy asked her how much it was and she told us there as a shop nearby! By this time we were running late cos we were due to meet the others and head off on a bus tour.
We decided to try and find the shop and legged it excitedly up the hill. We were rushing along when Harry noticed the street name. We rushed across the road, almost getting run over and the shop was 3rd on the left! Harry andI were so excited, trying on different colours, sizes. We asked the cost, 40Bs (c. 2.50GBP!). He sized us up and said he could have 2 ready later in he day. We both came out of the shop beaming from ear to ear. Let me explain....Harry is a trendy 19 yr old art student, she will be wearing her hat out on a nights out in Truro; I on the other hand will put it on my wall at home - although it may come in useful for the odd fancy dress party!
Can I also explain the position of the hat...this is VERY important! If married, the hat sits straight on the head; if single the hat sits at a jaunty angle! Hence why mine is almost falling off my head!! I've said that before loads of you lot do!!!
We rushed back to Loki Hostel and headed down to meet the tourist bus, a c. 3hr journey around the city and out to Moon Valley. The city tour wasnt really that good and Moon Valley was v. weird, rock formations in sort of stalagtite form.
It was then back to the hostel. We'd put our names down for the roast dinner at the hostel and as it was Claire and Wayne's last night with us it would have been rude not to have a few drinks!
We'd got Claire a card so Harry and I presented the card whilst wearing our new hats and carrying two of the car blessing items that Harry had bought! Yep, we did have some looks but who cares! The roast dinner was lovely. La Paz was full of fast food places, cake shops and ice cream parlours! We decided during the night to make a cocktail in "Bradders" honour...me, Harry and Jess went to the bar and decided on Sambuca and Baileys - little did we know that it is in fact already a cocktail called "slippery nipple". We headed back with our slippery nipples and downed the, in true shot stylie...though in fact they were more like half tumbler size! We had a few more drinks and headed to bed, we had a 0645 alarm call.
In the night the door opened, some random bloke came in and went straight into the bathroom! Which by the way had been closed off because earlier in the evening a massive piece of plaster has fallen frm the ceiling! Oh yeah...I would have been in the bathroom at the time it fell had I not been persuaded to have another beer! The song "Last night a Pilsner saved my life" is now a classic! Anyway, getting back to the random intruder...he came back into the room and started walking around in circles! I thought he was sleep walking/. By this time most of us were awake - Claire the "coke" girl as we had nicknamed her, got out of bed and led him onto the landing. Netx day she told us he wasnt sleep walking but was stoned out of his head - she should know!
So this was our last day in La Paz. I really enjoyed it there and would have loved more time to wander its streets and take it all in.
Safety is an issue there obviously - we know of 2 girls who were either robbed or almost robbed by bag grabbing/cutting or slashing trouser pockets to get cash. We, thankfully were all fine.
Taxis in La Paz are also an issue, the hostel had big signs saying only take radio controlled taxs or have one called from your hostel/restaurant.
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