After finding the most gorgeous cafe (originally founded by a Swedish traveller) I set off to walk the city with a guide, seeing the oldest street from colonial times, the cathedral, parliament square and the witches market. Afterwards, as the afternoon heated up from the sun, I took the cable car lines to see the city from a different perspective. It’s huge! A couple of things I learnt, a lot of buildings look unfinished because painted houses have to pay more tax. Also there are no high rise buildings or sky scrapers due to the land the city is built on. It once had multiple rivers running through it and so has left clay like soil. The biggest threat to the city is landslides, which with more rain in recent years have become more frequent.
Colourful, clean and hilly. Three words to sum up La Paz. Luckily no altitude sickness but I definitely walked a lot slower than usual and stopped to get my breath at the top of each climb.
After La Paz, it was two short flights to get to Sucre, said to be one of the most beautiful cities in Bolivia. It did not disappoint. Far less busy than La Paz, white washed buildings, terracotta rooftops and at a lower altitude it was a dream to explore on foot.
The most memorable and unexpected sight was to visit the peaceful, sprawling cemetery. It was Christmas Eve when we wandered round and lots of people were cleaning their relatives memorials and laying fresh flowers. A huge section of the cemetery was dedicated to those who died during the pandemic, a stark reminder of very recent shared global history.
We enjoyed climbing to different viewpoints in the city and wandering the streets, coming across churches and markets. For Iwona, after being sick since we arrived, it was a great first day exploring Bolivian life. We also enjoyed our first coffee of the trip in the sunshine. A perfect Christmas Eve.
