A Book to Read - Marching Powder by Rusty Young

A book about young love in a Bolivan Prison that makes cocaine.

Maybe not the official line but a nice little summary for you. Marching Powder is the story of Thomas McFadden a English drug smuggler who gets him self in a sticky situation called San Pedro prison, Boliva. Not your average prison, here you have to pay to get in and buy your own cell, prisoners live amongst families and cocaine is manufactured with its walls.

I give it a 7/10. 

Salty Boliva

                                                              

                                                               A lovely spot of lunch on the moon

                                                                 The famous Stone Tree....

              Lamar a former Lama 

     

We took a lovely little trip for a few days through the lagoons and salt flats of Boliva. Mel and Marcial joined us and we all jumped into the back of a 4x4 with a lovely driver and started the trip.

 This is the largest salt flat in the world with a span of 10,582 square kilometres. We were there in rainy season so you got a cool reflection off the salt as there was about an inch of water across the whole thing. 

The next leg of the journey was into the Desert and then too the lagoons, which felt like you were on the moon or some sort of planet, luckily no aliens were spotted. We saw lagoons that were red, blue and green they were a certain colour depending on the minerals in the earth. I think this red one was sodium but that's as scientific as I can explain. 

That night we stayed near the lake and there was the cutest little boy Fernando, whose cheeks were about 70% of his face. 

I'd like to say that he drew this but I drew most of it and he coloured, art has never been a strong one, don't think Marvel will be after me for copyright infringement.

Death Road

More of a visual post this one as whilst holding on to the handle bars of a mountain bike sailing down a dirt track winding around bends and under waterfalls, whilst passing crosses marking the spots that many people have fallen to their death it's hard to stop and take in the view. 

Death road was once the most dangerous road in the world and although a new road has been built many locals prefer to use this road still as it is shorter. Luckily for us there was a landslide earlier that day which meant that there were much less vehicles on the road. 

Once agin we were really lucky with our group, we were joined by 3 very hungover chileanians which ensured the pace of the day was slow. 

Apparently the clothes were protective...not look I'll be taking fashion inspiration from. 

La Paz

              

       

        

Got to La Paz a couple of days ago, after spending the first night drinking superbly priced beverages from a nearby hostel. Pound a pint happy hour and double gin for about 1.50, We were all soon nicely hammered and went home at a moderate time of around 11. Waking to realise we had missed breakfast we went for a stroll to find some form of brunch, this consisting for me personally a cheese burger meal from a fast food restaurant specialising in burgers, fried chicken and what looked like some kind of fried banana?? All in all, coke (glass bottle), fries (hand cooked vibe accompanied by a choice of mustard, ketchup or mayo. I opted for Mayo, mustard mix which was Gorgeous!) and cheeseburger  (with an extra bit of ham, as in pork ham. Not sure why but luckily I didn't really notice it) all for just a ball park figure of 1 pound. Have I woken up yet?? You couldn't even get a single small cheeseburger at McDonald's for that back home, at least not at the Newport coldra. Anyway the meal was delicious, a strong 7 out of 10, though price probably adding a certain bias to my judgment. I ate the meal in approximately 4 minutes and left the restaurant thanking the manager for the meal itself, clean toilets, selection of sauces and helpful English speaking staff.I then  attempted to ask him which way it was to the witches market in Spanish? To 'witch' he replied in English, two blocks turn left and carry on for around half a kilometer mate. I thanked him and said chow. Haz will now expand on the witches market. Oh no she won't, she wants me to do it. Well the witches market was alright, like a lot of things I've seen or done this week, I didnt really see the point in it. They had sex perfume which either makes you want sex, have sex, get better at sex or change sex??? I'm still not sure. Either way the branding was awful. 

Moving on, like an angels halo hovering above my head I discovered something which I think could be the thing I'm missing in my life and something which I think could become big back home in Wales. Above my head dangling from the ceiling were about 50 lama foetus's. All ranging from rabbit size to Labrador size. You burn them and the ashes are used to bring good luck, especially to new houses. I bought the biggest one for a bargain 25quid and we are going to have a ritual at haz's dads in New Zealand in 3 weeks.

Lake Titticaca

    

As a pitstop before Boliva we spent a couple of nights in Puno. This city sits right on the edge of Lake Titicaca, largest lake in South America which stretches between Bolvia and Peru. It is also the highest lake in world at 3,812 metres.

We stayed at Marlons house with Mel and Marcial also, Jannis and max also popped up so nearly all our Machu Picchu group were together again. 

We visited the famous floating islands the next day. We took at boat out to the Island of Uros, a collection of about 40 small islands all made of reeds, with a collective population of about 4000 people. Each island lasts about 30 years and are all man made from reeds cultivated on the lake. Every 10 days new reeds need to be laid to replace those that have rotted away underneath. When you step on the island it feels squishy like you are stepping marshmallows.That night we were going to go and find some guinea pig but we got stranded in our hotel from a freak storm that covered the streets in hailstones and looked like we had been in a blizzard. We noticed that many Peruvians didnt have windscreen wipers so to see you saw little hands poking around and wiping the 10cm thick of hail off the window unsuccessfully. 

The lakes are worth seeing but besides this there is not much else to see in Puno so you could even just do this as a day trip and then get a later bus to La Paz. We stayed 3 nights as we were delayed due to a local Bus strike, so we just waited it out before hopping on a bus to Boliva. 

Machu Picchu

Day 1

We did a 4 day jungle Trek to Machu Picchu and it was bloody wonderful. We in the standardly slow South American way from Cusco and headed straight for the highest section of our trip to do some mountain biking. Although us Welsh are used to and always prepared for the Rain this time we failed, the only two in the group without waterproof gear, I've never wished for a poncho so much. We headed off down the mountain, after having to carry our bikes through the rivers of waterfalls and ride through more waterfalls we got to our first night in Santa Maria.

Day 2

Today we had a 13 mile trek to conquer. Our group was now 8; 2 Swiss, 2 Germans, 2 Chillain and our guide Rene and us Welshys. The first half of the day was making our way along part of the Inca Trail, the path originally used by the Incas to send messages using messengers who ran on these tiny paths across the mountain side. We made a few stops on the way to shelter from the sun, one of which included chewing some coca leaves and having a shot of some home brew alcohol which had a dead snake in it... 

After lunch we had to cross the river. Not so much the Wye with raging rapids and bridges that conveniently had sometimes no railings or missing planks. Although this was nothing compared to the next hurdle - Death River. 

        The only way to cross this river again was via this shitty basket. Monmouthians imagine The Ferrie wire, great for a leisurely trip across the river in a boat on the water. Well Jamie I think we need to give this guy some tips as his wire was about 40m across and 70m up from the river and his boat was essentially a big basket, oh and you had to walk down a cliff to get there. Our Swiss pals informed us that they have these at home but it is only used for passing parcels etc and it is strictly illegal to put humans in, but nope here we were popping three people in at a time. 

We rewarded still being alive by having beers in the Natural hot springs and then having a night of Inca Tequila (horrible stuff with chilli), after visiting the equivalent of club griff we had a few tactical chunders ready for the next day of the trek.

Day 3

With 9 hungover humans at breakfast we decided it would be a great hangover cure to go ziplining... But anything was better than Death River again! After 4 ziplines one of which was 1.5km long and 250ft up from the valley we started our way to Aguascalientes. Our afternoon walk was 3 hours from Hydroelectria to the town that sits just below Machu Picchu. We followed the river and the trainline for the whole way, before an early night for an early rise the next day. 

Day 4 

We set off at 4.30am to be let into the bottom of Machu Picchu at 5am. With 1760 steps to go, the keen hippes in their Llama jumpers and hemp trousers are quickly left behind and only the fastest and fittest get to the top first, which suprisingly us. So basically it's amazing and so worth sweat to get up there. We left about 11am as the guides with the umbrellas started to arrive and it's too busy. So with 5 hours before our train back to Cusco we headed for the hot springs and the bar.