Bolivia

Plaza San Fransisco in La Paz with new friend Adri

In Sorata a little outside of La Paz

Much and yet very little has actually happened since I last wrote anything down.  I left the hills of Ecuador and, sprinted to Arequipa in the south of Peru.  I hiked around in the world's second deepest canyon for three days (Canyon del Colca), saw the requisite condors, and then took a bus to La Paz, Bolivia.  After spending a month in unfamiliar places across the Andes, when I finally smelled the formaldehyde of preserved llama fetuses wafting from the witches market, a wave of comfort filled me.  The Cactus hostel was still here, operating incredibly enough with unchanged prices: 30bs a night or about $4.50. Some things had changed though—the plaza was reconstructed, my favorite cafe, Pepe's, had closed, but all in all it was a little like coming home.  I immediately found Diane and Ron at Artesania Sorata and spent the day catching up and explaining as best I could what I was doing here anyway.  As usual though, South America has a way of making one wait to get anything done.  I contracted some unidentified and short lived feverish disease while keeping my salmonella-filled  roommate company, so am only now gearing up to visit the Quinoa growers association, El Ceibo (the  cocoa/chocolate cooperative (a real behemoth), and hopefully Coproca, the best alpaca yarn producers around.