Arica and La Paz

I decided to spend my last few days in Bolivia on the warm beaches of Arica in Chile, with my girlfriend, the journey from Cochabamba to Arica took 16 hours, but only because we were made to change buses in the way, and we had to wait a couple of hours in the open waiting for our connection bus, typical occurrences when dealing with Bolivia's unreliable bus companies. We started at Cochabamba at an altitude of 2800 meters, but before descending to the sea level at Arica, the road goes through the Altiplano, reaching a height of over 4000 meters, though offering a more spectacular scenery than the usual flat and dull Altiplano scenery, cone shaped, snow covered mountains rise along side the road offering amazing views, after the Bolivian and Chilean check points, the road starts to descend, a descend of 4000 meters, and the land scape changes to an arid desert, in fact the most arid region in the world.


Arica is a beach resort city, that Chile won from Peru in the war of the Pacific, we arrived so late to the city, that we decided to take the first the hotel we encountered near the terminal, the next day we moved to Hotel Saint George, which looked much better in the Internet pictures then in reality, there was a lot of maintenance work going on, and the outside pool was closed, but that might just be because of the lack of water, anyway all the simple rooms were booked, and the only one available with the high end one with a Jacuzzi, so we took it, can't complain about the quality of the room or the Jacuzzi, but we decided not stay more than one night, as it was rather expensive. In the afternoon we went for a walk around the beaches and the city center, we ate at a MacDonald's, something I usually don't do, but I allow my self to do it once in a few month while on vacation, anyway we decided which beach we liked, and the next morning we went there, I found a group of men and kids playing football and joined them for a game, after the game I went for a swim to cool down, I am not sure if I would have done if I did not feel so hot from the football game, as the water is rather cold. The sun sets were lovely though, and we made sure we were at the beach at the time of sun set, on both days we were in Arica.


The next morning I took my bus to La Paz and Mauge took her bus to Cochabamba, and I had the feeling that a phase of my life was coming to and end, and that a new one was starting. The journey to La Paz took nine hours, I went down in la Cecha in el Alto de La Paz, close to the airport, with all the strikes and the blockades going on, I did not want to take the risk that a sudden blockade is announced, and I would not be able to reach the airport, I checked into a hotel close to the airport, it gets damn cold here in the night, as it is still the Altiplano here, 4000 meters height, with day night extreme temperature difference associated with it, the hotel does not have heating, so I have to be in bed to stay warm in the night. Tomorrow morning I fly to Lima, and in the evening to Amsterdam, landing on 17:;40 on the next day, Wednesday, in Amsterdam, I will take the train to Eindhoven were I will stay for a couple of days before going to Utrecht.