Confined to my bed with cable TV
Travel Location: Cochabamba,Bolivia
We were in 2 minds when we woke up that Tuesday whether I would be able to make the 7 hour bus journey to Cochabamba: my stomach was just in a world of its own! We only decided to head there after meeting Mauricio who could only say great things about his home town and who actually invited us over to his father´s house. We were really hoping the visit would be worth it. Cochabamba´s economy is actually amongs one of the best of the country.
After 2 hours I thought I wouldn´t make it. Thankfully the bus stopped for a 10min break which was more than needed! As we were coming into Cochabamba we noticed several kms of lorry blocades on the road! Great, just what I needed! We had to get off the bus, walk for half an hour with our bags and squeeze into a packed taxi until the end of the blocade. Once we had made this, we had to catch another taxi into the centre. At this stage, I thought to myself ´you need a decent hotel to relax and get better, treat yourself´, so we did! We checked in a 3 star hotel, starting to feel better, but that was before realising that we´d not only forgetton my jumper in the taxi but also our South American travel guide book, our Bible! D´oh!!!
After the first night there was no chance I could move on so we checked in a second night. I must admit I did spend the whole day watching cable tv, attempting to eat and sleeping. Heaven!! That night we watched Scarface and realised half of the scenes are actually set in Cochabamba!! How spooky!
The following day I felt better so we booked our bus ticket to our next town Sucre for the evening. This gave us the whole day to explore the city and realise there isn´t a great deal to do… We never got back in touch with our friend Mauricio in the end as we found out his grandfather had died so didn´t want to bother him.
We went up the Cristo de la Concordia, a 33m tall statue located at the top of the San Pedro hill. It is in fact the tallest statue of its kind in the world, enen bigger than Christ the Redeemer in Rio, if you don´t include the base! The view over the city was worth the visit anyway. (Photos to follow)
