Lama foetus anyone ?

It was a cold and wet morning as we arrived in La Paz, at around 3700m, the world's highest capital. It would probably be hard walking around if the roads are flat, but they're not....for the most part they are very, very steep...the kind of place you get out of breath just thinking about going for a stroll. We soon booked into the not too majestic Hotel Majestic, our home for the next few days and passed out for a few hours, in the extremely cold room. Over the coming we were to find out that the room wasn´t just freezing cold in the morning, it was always like this ! This meant limited time spent here, and more time sampling the coca tea in the many nice cafes of La Paz. In total we spent 5 nights in the capital (and this was just the first visit of 3 !) - as ever, we didn´t seem to do a great deal apart from lots of wandering around and soaking up the generally mad vibe of this crazy place. One day we walked up to a park on top of a hill in the middle of town, which gave us a spectular vista of the whole of La Paz, with Mt. Illamani towering over the city.

La Paz & Mt. Illamani, 6402m

La Paz cathedral

We met up with our old friends Matt & Kathryn who we had originally met on the Pachamama tour in northern Chile and headed for a night out with them at ´Oliver´s Travels´ a traditional English Pub in the middle of Bolivia. Here we had a very enjoyable curry and a pint of beer, a most authentic experience !
One of the best things about La Paz was just to wander around and watch all the locals going about their daily business, the best place for this was the Witches Market where our hotel was. Now we don´t know if the women on the stores were actual witches, but you wouldn´t want to risk it. They all sold the most bizarre selection of things, from aphrodisiac potions to lucky charms to lama foetuses, which apparently bring good luck when buried under the porch of a new home.

Store in the Witches Market

The Witches Market

Another fantastic aspect of La Paz was the food, especially the 100% Natural cafe that we seemed to frequent almost everyday....we loved it ! This place and the cafe down the road where the crazy owner was possibly the world´s biggest Wycliffe Jean fan (give that DVD a rest, please...)
So yeah, a good time was had in La Paz. We also spent quite a bit of time researching what shopping would be done here when we returned in a few weeks. The shops were amazing, with so much Alpaca wool stuff to buy ready for the return to cold and rainy England. Oh and the choice of woolen finger puppets wasn´t too bad either....

Lady selling finger puppets

Lama foetus anyone ?

La Paz, Bolivia