Rurrenabaque - The Jungles and the Pampas - Part 1

Different people have different concepts about South America, before going there. Some go there to "find themselves", some to "loose themselves", some go there to trek, others come for the good food. There was only one picture in my (Lilya) head when I was planning my trip to South America. I wanted to see the Amazon basin, to float on a wide winding river, to see many big Ara parrots flying free above you, and maybe to see a sloth. A sloth is my favorite animal, ever since I was a kid, even though I never saw it in person. The chances to see one weren't great. It is a very quiet and shy animal that hides in the canopy of very high trees and doesn't move much. We searched for it all through Brazil instead of working on our tan, but there was no luck there. Amazingly enough, my dream vision of South America came true big time less than two weeks before the end of our journey in this continent.
The Amazon basin is located at the northern part of Bolivia. The Amazonas river itself doesn't pass through Bolivia but its main tributary, Beni does, so the views are pretty similar. The main town in that area is called Rurrenabaque. In order to get there from La Paz you can take a bus that goes through the Death Road, which is considered to be the world's most dangerous road, since around 200-300 travellers die yearly on that road. Somehow we didn't find it's name appealing enough, so we decided to take a flight. There are few daily flights leaving La Paz in that direction, so we took one of them. The plain was quite small, about 15 passengers, which is actually an advantage. Because of its small size it was able to fly really low between the mountain tops while crossing the Andes. The flight could have been much more extreme had it been windier that day, but it wasn't. After crossing the Andes, the amazing Amazon basin, with its vast jungles and wide rivers, reveals itself. We landed just like in an Indiana Jones movie on a tiny landing surface in the middle of the jungle. From there a small bus took us to Rurrenabaque where we met Yolene (our friend from previous posts). Together we had a great lunch (a huge and fresh fish from the Beni river) in one of the many good restaurants in town. The town is very different from other parts of Bolivia that we visited. It is very relaxed and much more resembles Brazil. Another important thing about it is that it is very worm, humid and doesn't suffer from lack of Oxygen. Very refreshing after almost two months of dry and cold climate and very little air to breath.
The funny thing was that Oren somehow lost his voice, so all the talking and all decisions were made by Lilya and Yolene, which was quite refreshing for them, but somewhat frustrating for Oren. Every time he wanted to say something, he had to whisper it to Lilya's ear, so everybody else though he was really shy.

Later we went searching for a suitable tourist agency in order to book a 4 day tour to the jungles. There are many different agencies in Rurre. One of our most important criterias was that the company will be eco-friendly. That means that our tour will have minimum effect on the environment. All the companies say that they are, but in a lot of cases you can easily see from the pictures on their walls (for example someone holding a baby alligator in his mouth) that they care more about the fast satisfaction of the tourists more than the well being of the nature. After checking few companies we decided to go with the one that costs more, but offered a more special experience. Since it is owned by indigenous people, they have a permission to go to more isolated areas of the jungle. Most of the other companies campsites are located within one-two hours sail on the river Beni. Our campsite was on another river, Tuichi, the one from the "Back from Tuichi" book. Actually, our agency was founded as an initiative of the Israeli writer of this book, who got lost in this area few years ago. It took us two hours sail in the amazing Beni river and another 4 hours in the shallower Tuichi river just to get to the campsite, from which we made all the walks. The closest village was 3 hours away (by boat). This tour was practically private. The three of us, our guide Pedro, our cook Candy and the boat driver were the only people in the campsite. It took us almost the whole first day just to get to our camping site. First we sailed through the very foggy parts of the enormous Beni river, which was very mystic. After we turned to the Tuichi river the water became shallower, so the boat got stuck on the rocks once in a while. In one part it got stuck so hard, that we had to go inside the river and to push it, you can imagine how excited that made us.

During the next days all we did was walking around in the jungle and eating. Even though there were only three of us, our lovely cook prepared a four course meal three times a day. We were still digesting the previous meal when we were already served the next one. All the stay there was pretty amazing. Imagine that all you hear for 3 days and nights is the sounds of the wild jungle. Since the vegetation in the jungle is very vast, you can't see many animals there, so for us the most important sense was hearing. You walk in a line behind Pedro, as quietly as possible and try to be lucky. There are a lot to hear in the jungle, lots of exotic birds, frogs, reptiles, sometimes even mammals, and if you are quiet enough, you can even hear ants chewing pieces of leaves! Our guide, Pedro, on the other hand, used all his senses in order to spot animals, even smell sometimes. He knew to recognize all the animals only by the sound they made, and he also knew to impersonate them.
What you can easily see in the jungle is an enormous amount of various types of vegetation everywhere you look. Plants that look as if they were taken from another planet. Vegetation so vast you can barely see any direct sunlight, not even at noon.

The Second day gave us more chances to see the animals. We walked for more than an hour, when the forest suddenly became alive. A family of monkeys made their way through the forest jumping from tree to tree. Pedro, who else, heard them first, when they were probably still on the other side of South America. By the time they reached us, it seems they were everywhere. We could see them jumping between the high branches making so much noise as if there were no predators in the jungle at all. And suddenly, they passed us, and the forest became quiet again. That wasn't the only interesting animal we saw. We saw an injured wild boar that day, that tried to run away when he spotted us, and a king eagle that flew just few meters from us when we walked by, interrupting its lunch, that included some unidentified scavenge.

We tried our luck again in the afternoon, when we went to the clay pools where the wild boars usually come at tea time. We sat there for more than half an hour, making almost no noise, but they remained hidden from us.

On our second night we went on a night walk. The fool moon couldn't help us there, so we had to use torches. Thanks to Pedro's sharp senses we saw few deadly frogs, big spiders, snakes and few hungry bats.

On our third day we were supposed to walk to another campsite, there to fish and then to go back by rafting. The walking part was good, all the rest was less successful. After more than two hours inside a very shallow river Pedro and the boat driver, whose name we don't recall, were able to catch 3 small sardines. Then we took the sardines to the main river, and used them as a bait for the big fish, while Pedro and the boat driver were trying to pump up the inflatable rafting boat. Both activities weren't very fruitful. Since Lilya and Yolene weren't really into catching fish, there were no casualties among the fish, and since the pump was broken there was no rafting as well. So we had to go back to our camp barehanded and un-rafted. Good thing they weren't counting on our fishing skills for dinner.

On our last day we spent the morning in preparing indigenous style handicrafts, which was more fun than we imagined, and then after another huge lunch we sailed back to Rurrenabaque.

The day after we returned we had a big farewell breakfast since Yolene had to go on with her journey and then went looking for an agency that will take us to the Pampas. All about our journey to the Pampas and how I finally met a sloth will be published soon, hopefully, in the second part of this post.

Tip 1: There are two companies flying every day from La Paz to Rurrenabaque: TAM and Amazsonas. TAM are a bit cheaper and have larger airplanes, maybe that is why they tend to cancel their flights now and then. If you don't have a lot of spare time, you better take an Amaszonas flight. You don't have to book in advance, usually one day is enough.

Tip 2: A very good but not cheap travelling agency: "La berraco de madidi". For details see this post.

Tip 3: A very delicious french bakery. Not as good as in Paris, according to Yolene, but that didn't stop us from eating there every morning.

Tip 4: Camila - a good place to eat local fish (the Tartar sauce is very good, but so are the other options).

Tip 5: Casa de campo, or something like that, is a very pleasant place to have breakfast. Its located in the garden of a nice senior couple, and they even have new copies of the "New Yorker".

Tip 6: During 5 nights we spent in Rurrenabaque we stayed in 4 different hostels and we couldn't fall asleep in any of them. Even though the streets look quiet, inside the rooms you somehow hear a laud music. In addition to that in the middle of the night all the dogs start to bark and don't stop until the morning. We heard that "Santa Ana" is nice and quiet, but they were full at the time.

Pictures

New pictures of the Bolivian jungle from Madidi National Park and from Rurrenabaque are now online:

Pictures

Pictures from the Pampas in Bolivia are now on line. This is probably the best album until now.

Planet Boliva (part 2)

(for the first post on Planet Bolivia click here)
Luck is an essential ingredient in everyday life, and even more important when traveling abroad. Its absence can be extremely difficult, though, in a third world country. We had great deals of luck for about 4.5 months in a row, no big problems arose, Pachamama was especially good to us. But when we got to Bolivia we run out of it...
After Isla del Sol, next on our plans was Salar de Uyuni - the great salt flatlands in the south of Bolivia and the largest in the world. While looking for an agency to book our tour with, we heard that there is no electricity in Uyuni, the town where all the tours starts at. We also checked the buses in the bus station and heard that the road was blocked because of demonstrations. Since knowledge is power, we felt strong when we entered the agency of Adolfo Andino and asked him if the lack of electricity and the road block are real problems for tourists going to the Salar. "Not at all!", said Adolfo, "The electricity is no problem and the bus only need to do a 10 minute detour to pass the road block. Only today I had a group going to the Salar for three days!".
Confident that we checked everything, we booked our three days tour with him. But in Planet Bolivia, honesty is not always the best policy. When we got to the bus that night, we discovered that the block is real and the bus has to take a different, much longer, route. Soon after starting driving (with a fashionable hour delay), the bus stopped and an official (a policeman? we don't know) got on the bus and asked if anyone has a bus driving license, because our driver didn't have one. Half an hour later things were miraculously solved and the bus started moving. Whether the license appeared from the thin air, or another driver came to the rescue, or maybe the policeman got a nice tip for his services, we just don't know. What we do know is that it might have been better if the bus had to return. The rest of the drive was a mystery: All through the ride we couldn't decide whether it is more cold or more bumpy. We do know that all night long we had ice on the window, from the inside!
The "maximum 10 minutes detour" turned to be a 5 hours delay and we got to Uyuni 2 hours after the tour should have started. We weren't late, though, because how can you be late to a tour that isn't starting at all?
Uyuni didn't have electricity for 4 days before we got there, and no one knew when and if it is coming back. Since fuel pumps doesn't work without electricity, there was no fuel and therefore no tours. When we asked when was the last tour the answer was "4 days ago". When we wanted to talk to Adolfo, the guy from La Paz that told us that there are tours, we were sent to call from the call center across the street.
After Adolfo promised to talk with Sandra, we didn't hear from him for the rest of day. By that time, Lilya was so pissed off that she wanted to shout at Adolfo as loud as she could, but he didn't answer our calls for the rest of the day.
We had to spend a full day in Uyuni. If there is a god forsaken place, it must be Uyuni. There is nothing to do there, but freeze in the empty streets. At night we saw that some of the lights are on and went back to Sandra, that promised us that the tour will start on the next day.
We spent the night at the coldest room you can imagine. We had to sleep inside our sleeping bags with all our worm clothes. We couldn't even read because it was just too cold to keep the hands outside the sleeping bags.
No tour started the next morning, of course, because the electricity was gone by the morning. We looked for another travel agency and found one that had fuel and hundreds recomandations in hebrew on the walls. After Lilya finally got to shout at Adolfo, he promised to give us back our money in La Paz, so went to book with that company (Ripley).
But there was another problem. ATMs need electricity in order to work, and since we paid all our money to Adolfo in advance (in La Paz), we didn't have enough money to pay for the tour. Oren had to run all over the town in order to find the bank which was open. The town center is not that big, but you try running at 3800 meters above sea level! After standing in line, running again to bring the passport, standing in line again, moving to another line and going back in line because the teller didn't have enough money in the drawer, Oren was able to get some money to pay for the tour.
The 3 days option was booked so we took the two days option and were sent to sit in a jeep full with people that did only one day in the Salar. Only later we understood that there is almost no difference between the two days and the one day tour (except for the minor fact that two days cost double the price of a one day). We visited the old train cemetery next to Uyuni, where we took pictures with trains having Einstein's equation (for Oren) and Newton's equation (For Lilya) on them. After few useless stops we crossed the Salar with the jeep until we got to the place where we ate lunch.
When we were about to leave the lunch place, we were told that the two of us are not leaving. Instead we were left at the cheep hostel without any explanations. Another couple that took our place in the jeep explained to us that tomorrow we can climb to the volcano next to the hostel. No guide or jeep stayed with us.
Other groups came after that but their guides stayed with them, even though they paid the same. During dinner we felt like abandoned children sitting alone, apart from the other groups.
On the next day we saw that the other groups had also jeeps that took them half way up. The climb itself was completely pointless since the view from 100 meters above the hostel was the same as the view we saw after 3 hours of climbing.
The only point of interest on the climb was a cave with 6 real mummies, 1500 years old. The family that died there preserved well because of the dry weather and the whole scene was very creepy. The cave was locked, of course, and we had to wait for a group with a guide to open it for us.
We got picked up after the lunch by the jeep that brought two new, German girls that were as surprised as us when they understood what was happening. We took their place and joined the other people in the jeep, all Israelis, to the Island of fish (Isla del Pescada) - a small hill in the middle of the salt plane covered with giant cactuses, some taller than 10 meters. The sun was good to us (Pachamama is a friend of us since Chile) and the place really looked amazing. The problems started again when we left. Our driver didn't really knew the way and the jeep got stacked inside the mud. We tried to help pushing it out but only got stinky mud all over our clothes. The bus back to La Paz was about to leave at 8 but it looked like we are not going to make it. Some of our new friends for trouble were religious, so they appealed to God in the sky and asked for a little consideration. After all, they are eating only Kosher food, in the one continent you just don't want any limitations on your food.
It probably helped, because we were rescued by another of the company's jeep just at 10 minutes to 8. On the way back to Uyuni the company's manager, which was with us in the jeep, talked to all our bus companies, making them wait for us to arrive.
One of our bus company`s buses did stay and wait but, of course, not the right one. We looked for our places on the bus, but found only other that were available and sat there. It suddenly became very important for the company that we'll move to the other bus. We still don't understand why, since they had no problem picking up random passengers that waited on the way and just sat in any place they had on the bus (on the stairs, floor and one on the other). Since it was that important, The bus stopped in the middle of nowhere and one of the company's guys came on board and yelled at us to move to the other bus "in one minute". They didn't even wanted to transfer our bags to the other bus and we had to yell back in order to get our bags. Our sits where taken in the new bus as well, so we had to sit separately. Lilya was the unlucky one, because she had to sit next to a huge French guy that was really unhappy by the fact he had to share the two sits with another person. All night long he pushed Lilya, if he was not too busy with complaining. When he wanted to get up, he found a good use for Lilya, as a shelf, and put his blanket on her.
In addition, the window kept opening up every two minutes, letting the freezing air go inside. That could have really destroyed the possibility to sleep, had there been one. But sleeping was not an option since the road was so bumpy that you had the same chances to fall asleep on a firing machine-gun.
We were so happy when we arrived to La-Paz. Even the fact that we had to fight for our bags didn't ruin that. We paid double that night and took a room in a hotel. Luckily enough, double the price of a hostel is not that expansive in La-Paz.

Tip 1: Never plan tight schedule in Bolivia. Keep enough spare days for any problem that might come out. You should also always expect those problems, because at some time it will happen.
Tip 2: Always take your sleeping bag with you to the drive to the Salar. It can be a very cold night.
Tip 3: We were very disappointed by the lack of professionalism of the following 3 tourist agencies: Adolfo Andino in Sagarnaga st. in La Paz, Sandra in Uyuni and Ripley in Uyuni as well.

Planet Bolivia

Planet Bolivia. If Peru was third world, than Bolivia must be the forth world. Almost from the moment we entered we got the Bolivian special experience. We crossed the border with the bus from Puno in the Peruvian side of the lake Titikaka to Copacabana in the Bolivian side. We looked for a ferry that will take us to Isla del Sol - an island next to the shores of Copacabana. Only after we bought the tickets, we discovered that there are no ferries to the island because of the stormy weather. We managed to get on board of another ferry, a local one, which of course took us to the wrong part of the Island. While most of the tourists arrive in a village in the central part, we got to the north. The village we got to looked like a very cold, laid back fisherman village and we did find a place to sleep, but what about eating? We searched until we found something that looked like a restaurant, but not from the usual type where you can order food but from the type where they tell you "come back later!" all the time. They didn't look as if they where really keen to sell something that day, so we had to spend the time till then freezing outside.

While waiting for this "later" to come, we went touring the small village, passing on the way small group of sheep and enjoying the tender sound of techno music. TECHNO MUSIC??? Shouldn't this be a quiet Bolivian island? Well, in our planet Bolivia, there is a coexistence between sheep and party people. Two minutes from the village, on the beach there was a party. The electronic music sound joined with the sound of the sheep and gave the day the necessary bizarre ending.
We were still hungry so we went back to the restaurant to see if "later" has arrived. At 7 in the evening, at last, our interest (hunger) and their interest (money) finally met and we got our (quite delicious) dinner. We went to sleep early that day in our special bed covered with Dora sheets in a mud hut that was our home for the day.
On the next morning we went hiking in the northern part of Isla del Sol, getting a really nice view on Lake Titikaka. When we got back and wanted to take the boat to Copacabana the problems started. In a small village, which is totally depended on its boats, you might have thought that getting real information about departure times will be easy. But in planet Bolivia nothing is really easy. Everyone has it's own opinion (never facts in Bolivia, only opinions...) about the times and whether there is boat at all. At the end we took a boat to another village, and from there the service van to Copacabana, just to find out that there are no buses to La Paz, because of the wind. What does the wind has to do with a bus drive? Well, in order to get from Copacabana to La Paz you have to cross a small strip of Lake Titikaka. There is no bridge, although the government wanted to build one. The locals objected, and why shouldn't they? Each of them has its own boat that can take some paying costumers across the lake, or a bathtub-like platform that can carry buses and cars. The view of the swinging from side to side on the unstable platform is really something else. That is why the whole passage is blocked when there is wind. We waited in Copacabana few hours until the crossing was opened and took a minivan to La Paz.

On the main road near La Paz we saw another Bolivian genius idea. They were just marking the marks on the road and didn't want the drivers to step on them, so they put medium size rocks in the middle of the road. The drivers, of course, accidentally hit those stones, spreading them all over the road and turning the highway into a dangerous obstacle for the other drivers. We got to La Paz at night. At the next morning, La Paz looked pleasant and we began to think we hallucinated everything because of the Malaria peels we were taking. But the real nightmare was still to come...

Pictures

We added two picture albums:

Isla del Sol:

Salar de Uyuni:

The posts about our adventures in those places will be published soon.

The Salkantay Trek and The Machu Picchu

There are few ways to see the famous Machu Picchu. The nicest way to do it is by trekking. There are at least 3 different treks that end at the MachuPicchu. The most famous is the Inca Trail, that follows the ancient (few hundred years) path of the Incas. Since it is that famous, you have to book it few months in advance. We took the alternative route, the 5 days Salkantay trek.
The first day of the trek started so early that you can say that it started the night before. We gathered together with about 30 other tourists in Plaza San Fransisco. Fortunately enough, we soon found out that only 8 of them will be in our group. After few (maybe 3, maybe 6) hours of very bumpy road our bus got stuck. Luckily enough it got stuck at the entrance of the village we were aiming to get to. After breakfast we were introduced to our "family group", or at least that is what our guide Reinaldo called us. After that we started the slow climb (19km) towards our first camp at an altitude of 3900m (the village was at 2900m). The view of the first day wasn't too breathtaking, so we used the time to get to know our "family group". The group was very diverse once again. There was one Australian couple (Kate and Ben), one Scottish couple (Lisa and Eddie) one Brazilian couple (Thiago and Ana Lucia), a guy from Quebec (Christian) and one Peruvian guy (Fernando). All of them were really nice and very interesting.
The great thing about the Salkantay trek is that they feed you and take care of all you need all the time, all you need to do is walk... and a lot. Everyday there is a big breakfast, including eggs and pancakes, a big lunch, with soup and meat, and even bigger dinner.
The first night was quite cold, but only outside. Our tents were placed inside a big tent that protected us from the cold wind. In the morning, when we woke up (by the cook which brought us a hot cup of tea to the tent) we saw a lot of ice everywhere, even parts of the river was frozen.

The second day was the longest (21km). We started the day by climbing to the high pass (4600m). The climb turned out to be less hard than the climb to the Santa Cruz pass. Maybe it were the new walking sticks we purchased for the trek that made it easier, or maybe it was the fact that we got used to those kind of altitudes, or maybe both. Unfortunately, this pass was also less impressive. The rest of the day we spent down-climbing to 2900m. The interesting part was to see the landscape change from glacieral to a vast jungle in less than 5 minutes walking. The new climate was completely different too, so the second night was very worm. We spent the night in a very small farm surrounded by many farm animals. We even got to pet a small and very spoiled pig.

The third day was supposed to be a "botanical day", but it turned out to be a bit boring walking day. At least it wasn't long, about 14km. After that we had lunch and said goodbye to the nice mules that carried our main equipment for the last two days and a half. From this point we had to be our own mules. A minivan took us to Santa Thereza, a small town somewhere on the way. In the afternoon we even went to a natural hot spring, where we were cooked and served to the suicidal bugs, that covered us even at the cost of drowning. In the evening we had another great dinner, but this time a new member joined the group. As part of the attractions of our camping site there was a small and a very cute monkey, named Pancho, running free between the dinning guests. After running around and amusing everyone, Pancho got tired, he jumped into Lilya's lap and fell asleep until the end of dinner. You can imagine that Lilya didn't eat much that night (but she didn't mind).

On the fourth day we didn't walk much. We skipped the first boring walking part and got a ride with a minivan straight to lunch. From there (a town with the romantic name Hidroelectrica) there was about 11km until Aguas Calientes, which is a very touristic town next to the Machu Picchu. The trail followed the train rails, but it wasn't boring at all. It was deep in the jungle, which made it very unique. At the end we got to a hostel, and took a most welcomed hot shower. Not all the members of our group were that lucky, it's a bit ironic not to have hot water in a town called Aguas Calientes (Hot waters). We visited the reason this town is called that way (thermal springs) later together with Thiago and Ana Lucia. The place was full with tourists just like the rest of this town, but we had a great time just enjoying a good conversation in the worm, murky water. Later that evening we went drinking with all the group. Even though there are tourists everywhere, there are a lot of empty restaurants. Those places will do absolutely everything to get costumers. They extended the Happy Hour for all day long and they compete with each other for the amount of cocktails you will get for the price of one. At the end we went to a place that offered us 8 drinks if only we will pay for one. The problem is that all the 8 drinks shared the amount of alcohol suitable just for one, so we weren't very drunk at the end of the process.

The next morning (or should I say night) we woke up at 3:30 and started the climb to the Macchu Picchu. The climb was very intense and included more than a thousand stairs, some say 1600, but we didn't count them all. Since it was dark we were not aware to the amount of people climbing together with us. When we got to the top we realized that there were few dozens of people there before of us. After more than half an hour of waiting they opened the site and let us in. The few hundreds of people that entered were a drop in the sea when the people from the Inca trail and the tourists with the buses started to come. They say that about 3000 visitors enter the site every day. But we managed to stay away of the crowd most of the time.

One of the special things about this site is that it wasn't destroyed by the Spanish like rest of the Incas' places. It's not like the Spanish appreciated its beauty and wanted to preserve it, they simply didn't find it. The Incas destroyed the paths leading towards this town, so it was lost until 1911. That's why it is very well perserved. We also learned few things about the Incas. First of all, they were in great shape, just to go uphill to your neighbor you burn your dayly amount of calories. More important, the Incas understood that in realastate its all about location, location, location. The location is the really the amazing part of this place. Everywhere you look there are very high pointed mountains covered with evergreen rain forest.

Since we got there early enough, we got the opportunity to climb enother cliff, the Huainapicchu. That is the steep (very steep) cliff at the background of the Machu Picchu in every photo. The climb takes another hour and is quite exhausting, but the view is worth it. The way down is not for the weakhearted. At some parts the stairs are really nerrow, high and steep.

We spent at the Machu Picchu half a day and then returned to Aguas Calientes. From there it was a long way back to Cusco.

Most of the next day we spent with our new friends from the trek, and the morning after that we took the bus to Puno on the shores of Lake Titikaka.

Tip 1: The Machu Picchu site is probably the most touristic place in South America. It is better to get to this area after trekking, then the over-tourism won't bother you as much. Even if you can't do the whole trek you can at least do the 4th day of our trek, from Hidroelectrica to Aguas Calientes.

Tip 2: If you are interested in climbing to the Huainapicchu (the mountain at the background of all the famous Machu Picchu pictures), you have to get to leave Aguas Calientes at least at 4 am. Only the first 400 "lucky" tourists get permits.

Tip 3: If you are planning to climb to the Machu Picchu bring an extra T-shirt. You get to the top all wet at 5am, and then you have to wait in line in the chilly morning at least half an hour until they let you in.

Tip 4: You can get a cool Machu Picchu stamp in your passport next to the entrance, so don't forget to bring it.

New Picture Collection

We added a new collection of the best people pictures. We also added name tags for us and our friends in some of the pictures.

Pictures

Pictures from the Salkantay trek to the Machu Picchu: