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Written by: -
Ian Wilcock
Manchester, England
Dates: - July 28 1998
Email: - iwilcock@hotmail.com
Comments: - This is an account of an overnight bus journey from Uyuni to La Paz which became a memorable experience for all the wrong reasons. The temperature when we left Uyuni at 8pm was already below freezing so we thought we had put on enough clothes to stay warm (long distance buses in Bolivia are not draught-proof and donīt have either heating or toilets) Despite wearing two pairs of socks, five layers on the top part of my body, a pair of gloves and two woolly hats, I still froze (my mistake was I should have worn two pairs of trousers.) The roads were in a dreadful state, either deep ruts where the bus rocked and rolled about, or corrugations where the bus vibrated like crazy. The bus stopped twice during the night so that people could relieve their bladders (the men just peed in the road, I have no idea where the female passengers went). We changed buses in Oruru at 7:30am (another quick trip to the toilet) and by the time we arrived in La Paz after the 15 hour journey at 11am I was frozen stiff although at least by this time the sun was up so the temperature had got above zero. When we got to our hotel at mid-day I sat in the warm sun for half an hour, had a hot shower and got in to bed for three hours under every blanket I could find and finally thawed out.
Rating: - 3
Weather: - Cold
Terrain: - Altiplano
Route: - Overnight bus from Uyuni to La Paz
Essentials: - Warm clothes
About
SAE: Membership Services: Join/Renew
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South American Explorers |