We reached Copacabana with a young french couple whom we met on our way to Puno in Peru. Once in Copacabana, we immediately felt more relaxed and celebrated our escape from Peru with a Pisco sour and Pina colada ! It was big time celebration of the Candelaria feast here and we went to dance with the locals who were drinking endless bottles of beer. The next day we visited the sun island and the moon island on the lake Titicaca. The Island of the moon had a cemetery which was probably for Inca women belonging to an upper class. The Island of the sun was beautiful. We visited one of the Inca ruins perched on one of the hills. I particularly liked the wild shore line with no one except for cows and pigs running around and huge cactuses on the hills with flowers in bloom. The floating islands were these man made patches of straw and wood. They were breeding trout fish here. We stopped by to have some fresh trout. By now it was windy and the lake was really choppy. The boat bounced around like crazy and vented out lots of diesel smoke.  We started feeling sick 🤢 To make things worse, this was to take almost an hour! The captain stopped midway at another floating island. The weather was too rough for the boat to handle. We were made to get down and take a bus instead for the rest of the journey. We barely had a few minutes left to catch our bus to LaPaz. So we ran to pick up our bags which we left with the tour operator and then ran towards the bus stop. I was out of breath by the time we were in the bus and about to lose it when a hippie lady came with a platter full of pastries. We bought a few freshly baked goodies and were all set for our 3 hour bus journey. We were to reach by 10 p.m. at the bus terminal and check into a hostel that was 5 minutes away. Of course things didn’t go exactly as planned. We reached the strait of Tiquina with no bridge available for a cross over. It was windy, rainy and there were many other buses. The driver asked everyone to get down and take a boat as the river crossing was supposed to be dangerous. The bus was to cross the river on a wooden raft! So we decided to stay in the bus while the others diligently got down to take a motorboat. We finally arrived in LaPaz after six hours – tired, sleepy and cold. The driver dropped us at some random place away from the terminal. Luckily we got a reliable cab who dropped us all at the hostel. We were hoping someone would open the door at that time of night. They did open the door but we were told that our private room had been given away to other tourists. Fortunately, we were allowed to stay the night in a dormitory with cold beds. 

The next day we went to watch a female wrestling match which is popular with the Bolivians. The wrestlers or Cholitas wear traditional Bolivian attire and fight like WWF wrestlers. It was cheesy but fun. We walked around La Paz historical centre and visited some witchcraft markets that stock all sorts of paraphernalia – magic potions, incense, crystals, mummified or skeletons of baby lamas, etc. We took the cable car to have a bird’s eye view of the city which is at an altitude of 3,625m. Most of the houses are left unfinished with no plaster or paint (like in Puno, Peru and in Copacabana). We saw many homeless people begging on the streets. Everything is cheap in LaPaz! We found a lot of lovely handicrafts. I didn’t get anything as I have absolutely no space left in my backpack 😅