The 1000 Day Holiday

 A major game in the Boliva football league was on tonight. So we decided this was a must see.

High/low lights:

• Chanting from the ´serious´supporters behind the goals.
• 🙁 aerial fireworks being thrown onto the field, with the explosions hitting players
• 11 Yellow cards and 3 red cards. A super clean game!
• 🙁 1 fatality when supporters rushed an entrance gate trying to get into the game and crushed a woman.

Different people from the hostel had decidedly different experiences. We were alright, as we were in more expensive seats ($6) via another entrance. some trying to get in with $1.50 tickets were treated to police in riot gear w police dogs & tear gas as they tried to restore order where the woman was hurt.

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Today I also visited the Boston Clinic in La Paz to get a followup malaria test.

This is a simple procedure.

However once this had been done. I was introduced to another 3 doctors and 4 nurses.

The purpose? To have 8 photos of said doctors and nurses with me. Why? Im famous because I have had cerebral malaria.

I think Im going to be posted on their noticeboard in the foyer…  Awaiting the results now…

La Paz is a city sitting at 3500m, in a huge canyon. Spent the day wandering the streets. checking out the markets where they sell Lama fetus´ for medicinal purposes.. would make quite a good chew toy by the look of them.

Have settled on my transport options for getting to Carnaval in Salvadore, Brazil by the 15th Feb.

• get to Lima by 27th ish
• fly to iquitos
• take fast boat to the border town Tabatinga 12hrs
• take fast boat to Manus (brazil) 36 hrs
• take boat (fast??), or slow boat 4 days to Belem
• take bus to Salvador for Carnaval!

Now just to work out how many km´s thats covering. 3725km apparently, excluding the bus from Belem.

hung out here for 2 days, not really doing much apart from walking around. Its got ´nice´buildings which are well quite pretty..  but definately prefer Potosis cramped streets.

much lower altitude tho. 2700m which makes the walking around a lot easier..

I hope this is the most boring post Im ever going to make.

we got delayed a day by rain, however the tour comapny put us up in schmick hotel for a night for free.

Day 1 Up in the mountains, the 3 aussie girls in the jeep not enjoying the drop off from the road.

Day 2 was the 4wd getting stuck on an alpine snow & mud trail, having to push, followed by crazy lush alpine meadow vista for lunch.

Day 3. lots and lots of lagoons. Highlight was in the afternoon getting bogged on a mud salar. 2 hours of digging, the drivers refusing to use the winch on the other jeep, then finally using 2 jeeps to pull it out. Thus continuing our journey for 600m where another of the jeeps gets bogged. This one a quick fix. Then 10 minutes later another tyre blowout.

Day 4. We made it to Salar de Uyuni. Totally wow. by this stage we were in a convoy of 3 jeeps. one of which had had 5 tyres blow out and a severly leaking radiator.  Said jeep was being towed by the time we got to the island in the middle of the Salar. This was then unloaded and abandoned. we got around 10minutes from the island and the other jeeps driveshaft broke. So we towed that to the edge of the Salar and then abandoned them. So many many hours were spent baking/burning on the Salar and enjoying its surrealness.   

A great 4 days. enough Jeep time for a long time 🙂

With all my bills being handled directly by my insurance company I had no idea on the total cost of my treatment.

I contacted my insurance broker and got him to find out.

• 17 days in hospital, ~7 of them in Intensive Care.
• All medications
• Stomach ultrasound
• Chest Xrays

The total  $5400NZD

Incredibly cheap. I think the Argentinian Government picked up a large portion of the cost as they provide free medical for tourists.

For example when I first tried to go to the hospital for a blood test, the hostel arranged a house call from a doctor which was covered under this arrangement.

Off tomorrow on a 4 day tour of SW bolivia.

Check out these pics

The buses even in bolivia are flash in comparison to africa. And the roads have been ok. Dirt and corrugated, a few times down into first gear for descents but nothing too scary as yet.

 

Confirmed free of Malaria today! 🙂

So 1am I head for Tupiza, Bolivia Love this quote from the wiki.

Bus accidents with few survivors are not uncommon in this region, due to precipitous dropoffs as the mountainous routes ascend and descend between towns.

There is the train as well tho.

Well this is sort of.

Went and had the test today. Waited around while they analysed the slides.

They did find 2 Parasites, however they say it counts as a Negative result. I dont know what stage the parasites were (exoploded from qunine?). However Im still on qunine & doxy till Thursday when I have a final test.

And then Im allowed to leave. In which case Ill be headed for Bolivia, Thursday or Friday. Apparently Ill be safe from Malaria for the next 3 months due to the Qunine already in my system (?).

And for those that think all these adventure activities dont really have any risk… Check out this news article: Caving Mishap in SA

Did my blood test today at the lab. So I got to see a bunch of my slides under the microscope. Well groovy.

Initially they looked like this, with up to 6 or 7 parasites in one cell. Once Quinine is doing its thing, they are just exploded blobs within the cell 🙂