07/12/2022 From Copacabana to La Paz
What to expect
La Paz
We still got it
Once in a while we are staying in a party hostel to prove to ourselves that we are not washed up (yet) 😉. Today was one of those days. We are staying in the Wild Rover, which is a party hostel chain throughout Peru and Bolivia. Until now we had been avoiding it though 😉.
On Wednesday they have a karaoke night in the hostel bar. So together with some other backpackers we checked out the atmosphere. Blake even sang the final song of the night: “Don’t stop believing”. I’m sure it brought him back to his party days six years ago when he was running a party hostel in Vietnam for a few months.
08/12/2022 La Paz
In La Paz we have run into so many other backpackers we had met in different cities in Panama, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru! It’s a backpacker melting pot!
Have breakfast at “Café del Mundo”
Blake and I had breakfast at Café del Mundo, with a German girl, an English girl and a Dutsch guy from the previous night.
Join a walking tour and visit the Witches’ Market
Afterwards we joined a walking tour with “red cap” for $3. During the tour we also visited the Witches’ Market (“Mercado de las Brujas”), where dead baby lamas were hanging off the roof which are used as offererings. Different cultures, I guess…
The walking tour was very interesting. But we had to leave early as we had another activity booked for today: cholita wrestling.
Watch the Cholita Wrestling
“Cholita” was traditionally a derogatory name for lower class women of mixed indigenous heritage. These wrestlers reclaim the term while poking fun at themselves, wearing the traditional costume of peasant women and playing up their feistiness. […] The Cholitas really are tough —they swing each other around the ring, bonk each other on the head, yank long braids, and pin each other in headlocks.”
atlasobscura.com
So bizarre
The Cholita Wrestling was one of the most bizarre things we’ve ever seen. The audience was full of internationals who watched two older women in traditional clothing wrestle against each other. Most of the time I was thinking: What is happening here?! But it was quite entertaining (but also very weird!).
09/12/2022 From la Paz to Uyuni
Relaxing day ahead
Today was another one of Blake’s “game days” aka world cup games. This worked very well for me because I was happy about a low key day in the city. We booked the night bus and the tour for the next three days. Then I went back to the “Café del Mundo”, where I ran into two Aussie girls we had done the Lagune 69 trek in Huaraz with. Blake went into a pub where I later joined him for the second game of the day.
Off to the Salt Flats
Later on we went out for a delicious dinner at “Yati Bolivia”, before catching the night bus to Uyuni for our next three-day-adenture (which we almost missed after a whole day of relaxing – so typical for us).
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