Monday 18th April 1988
I said “adios” to Anita and Reinhard who were returning to Cuzco by train and set off to get a colectivo from a point on Avenida el Ejercito, which was two blocks past the hospital. As usual we had to wait for a full complement of passengers before we could leave.
A Dutch couple made up the numbers at 07:30 hrs. and we set off along the southern shores of the great Lake Titicaca. It cost 130 I/- for the two-hour trip to Yunguyo along a bumpy road with good scenery, passing a number of brown mud brick towns. Fishermen plied among the reeds on rush canoes on the lake.
Yunguyo is a town in the Puno Region in southeastern Peru. It is the capital of Yunguyo Province and Yunguyo District. Yunguyo is located on a peninsula on the shores of Lake Titicaca. The border with Bolivia runs next to the town and a road connects it with the town of Copacabana located a few kilometres away on the Bolivian side of the peninsula.
At Yunguyo we found a tranquil pleasant town where stocky Indian women changed money from wooden boxes under big parasols. They weren’t too keen on changing Intis and only wanted $US dollars.
We had the usual wait for a full bus load in a dusty side street. I changed my remaining Intis into chocolate. At last, at 11:00 hrs. we set off for Copacabana. This cost 1 Boliviano, the basic unit of money in Bolivia; equal to 100 centavos, and there were 2.3 Bolivianos to the American dollar.
We were stamped out of Peru, some of us having to pay 5 I/- for a mysterious ticket which probably a contribution to the Customs Officers Beer Fund. We checked in at Bolivian Immigration and although an official said he would like to search our bags we ignored him, feigning non-comprehension of Spanish, and we jumped back onto the bus unmolested.
We bumped down an atrocious road into the Bolivian town of Copacabana, a pleasant looking place for a border town, and a quick dash and 5 Bolivianos got us the last three seats on the 13:00 hrs. bus to La Paz.
We had some makeshift collapsible seats in the central aisle, but it was better than standing for five hours for the 147.2 km (92 mile) road journey. Our fellow passengers were bowler-hatted women with babies wrapped in colourful blankets and sturdy Indian men in suits and trilbys.
The road was a pretty bad dirt track so it was a welcome break to get off the bus for the ferry crossing across the Estrecho de Tiquiña, a narrow constriction at the south east end of Lago Titicaca.
The Strait of Tiquina is located on Lake Titicaca on the Bolivian side of this, in the department of La Paz. It is a separation (or union), of the two bodies of water that make up Lake Titicaca, the largest part in the north called Chucuito and the smallest in the south called Huiñaymarca. It has a width of about 780 meters, which can be easily crossed by powerboat.
A passenger raft service runs through it permanently, and pontoons are used for vehicles. This route is part of the road that connects the city of La Paz and the coastal city of Copacabana on the border with Peru. We paid 0.5 Bolivianos for the bumpy trip across in a launch, while the bus was taken over separately on a flat landing craft.
On the east bank was a colourful statue of a Bolivian soldier bayoneting a Chilean. The legend promised that what once belonged to Bolivia would do so again in the future. This was a protest to Chile cutting Bolivia off from the sea.
We continued through nice scenery, the wide flat altiplano and the snow-capped bounding mountains. At 17:00 hrs. we came to the outskirts of La Paz, officially known as Nuestra Señora de La Paz, and also Chuqi Yapu in Aymara, which is the seat of government as well as the legislative and executive capital of the Plurinational State of Bolivia.
The city, in west-central Bolivia 68 kilometres (42 miles) southeast of Lake Titicaca, is set in a canyon created by the Choqueyapu River. It is in a bowl-like depression, part of the Amazon basin, surrounded by the high mountains of the Altiplano. Overlooking the city is the towering, triple-peaked Illimani. Its peaks are always snow-covered and can be seen from many parts of the city.
At an elevation of roughly 3,650 metres (11,975 feet) above sea level, La Paz is the highest capital city in the world. Due to its altitude, La Paz has an unusual subtropical highland climate, with rainy summers and dry winters.
La Paz was founded on 20 October 1548, by the Spanish conquistador Captain Alonso de Mendoza, at the site of the Inca settlement of Laja as a connecting point between the commercial routes that led from Potosí and Oruro to Lima.
The low mud brick buildings and rough alleyways looked like a scene from a “Mad Max” film. The traffic threw up trails of dust. Road works were underway, and the setting sun silhouetted the workers against the fog of brown dust.
The drive into the centre was painfully slow with numerous stops for people to get off and retrieve their anonymous looking sacks from the roof rack. The town was concentrated in a huge bowl amongst the mountains. Crude housing clinging to the outskirting highland descended to a central cluster of modern skyscrapers.
The dominating snow-capped mountain overlooking the city was turning red as the sun went down. Illimani is the highest mountain in the Cordillera Real (part of the Cordillera Oriental, a subrange of the Andes) of western Bolivia. The snow line lies at about 4,570 metres (15,000 feet) above sea level, and glaciers are found on the northern face at 4,983 m (16,350 feet). The mountain has four main peaks; the highest is the south summit, Nevado Illimani, which is a popular ascent for mountain climbers.
We got off the bus in a seedy side street and began walking downhill into the city centre. It was the evening rush hour and we walked down against the tide of workers who were homeward bound. The pavement was choked with squatting Indian street traders, their wares spread out on blankets, so we were forced to walk in the cobbled road alongside the impatient traffic.
I split from the Dutch couple who were going to a different hotel and found my way through a bustling pedestrian precinct to the Plaza Murillo. From here it was only a few yards downhill to the Hotel Torino on Calle Socabaya.
I got a huge single room in this old convent (monastery?) for 5.50 Bolivianos in the cloisters overlooking the central courtyard. I threw in my bags and got the receptionist to put in a new socket and light bulb so that I could see.
I then went for a short walk around. I dined in the Catay Chinese Restaurant, just off Plaza Murillo and had my first Bolivian beer. The bottle had a colourful label, but it foiled all my attempts to get it off without tearing it.
My final walk around the locality revealed a very modern area of neon-lit shop signs and fast-food restaurants, cinemas and steep sloping streets. Army-like Policia stood in groups in ponchos on street corners with visible, business-like weapons and gas grenades. They looked very bored.
I returned to the Hotel Torino for an early night.
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