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La Paz...We sleep in and enjoy the great shower in our ensuite. We head up a floor for breakfast but are left a little disappointed by our tea/coffee and one piece of rock hard bread with jam. Rock hard bread for breakfast is starting to wear a little thin.
We're off early to suss out flight prices and tours to the Amazon and head to the offices of America Tours, mentioned in Lonely Planet. We've been tossing up whether to do the 'scary as hell mountain bus ride' for 18 - 24 hours to Rurrenbaque, or to fly, if it's not too expensive as it'll save us time and ruined nerves.
At the offices we're told the flights are $150 US per person, return. So we dilly dally some more, and then bite the bullet and book the flights. The tours on offer for three days, two nights are around $150 - $180 and we hum and ha and ask a tonne of questions before deciding to go with a jungle tour, rather than Pampas, and book. We're booked on the first flight out the following day and then a flight at the end of a three day tour to Mashaquipe Lodge in the Amazon jungle. It seems like we'll be the only two on our tour.
Tickets and tour voucher in hand we leave and go back to the hostel. Back at the hostel we decide we'd prefer to fly the day after our tour ends so we can make the most of the third day, so its back down to the America Tours office, where they set about making the flight change for us.
We have lunch in a little cafe, dining on juicy meat saltinas, which were nice, similar to Cornish pasties but with a spicy kick. Full, we find Plaza San Francisco where the shoe shine boys are kitted out in balaclava's making them look rather unsavoury folk. We hunt down the Witches Market where we see oddities like dried llama foetuses, dried frogs, starfish, armadillos, and other odd things. Past the oddities we find a plethora of artisan stores and do a lot of window shopping. We eye up things to buy when we return to La Paz; hammocks, scarves, jerseys and more.
Late in the day we head back to the America Tours office and find our 6.15am flight is set for 8.30am. Fingers crossed it's not delayed much. Heading back to the hostel we grab some fried banana chips for 1 sole a pack! We get some donuts for breakfast, 2 soles each! Love the cheapness of Bolivia!
Tomorrow we are jungle bound...
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