HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!!
I hope you have an absolutely fantastic day filled with lots of good food and tennis. Love you!
Santa Cruz was nice enough but we only stayed there for 2 days. Our first day was a really great day filled with nothing. We arrived at 7 am, found a hotel, and then sat for 5 hours in a restaurant (a famous Irish pub) that overlooked the main plaza with the people we crossed the border with. We people watched, I drank nice coffee, and planned out our time in Bolivia. Compared to planning our time in Brazil, it was much easier to plan an itinerary (much smaller country and lots of advice/recommendations that we picked up over the last 2 months).
View from the restaurant
The next day in Santa Cruz was short but sweet. We woke up early and went back to the main square. We were determined to get coffee from the men walking around (it was delicious but incredibly sweet). We sat and people watched for a while and then made our way to Samaipata via shared taxi.
There are a few ways to get around Bolivia as a backpacker. In order of comfort (in my opinion): flying, shared taxi, bus, and hitch hiking. Although we met a lot of people flying, and it seemed like a great option, we decided that we wanted to save our money. We've found shared taxis to be a great option in terms of price and comfort. Our taxi to Samaipate fit 8 people (plus all our bags), lasted 4 hours, and cost 30B (around $4.25). While we've taken one overnight bus in Bolivia and it wasn't too bad (we both got over 6 hrs of sleep), the buses here are never recommended. You tend to hear a lot of horror stories from fellow travelers about things being stolen, buses breaking down, no bathrooms with no stops, and 12 hr rides turning into 24 hr rides.
We've tried hitch hiking only once and it was with Israelis (surprise surprise). We didn't end up taking it.
Samaipata was amazing. We stayed in a really great bed and breakfast with an amazing restaurant, swam in a waterfall, went hiking in the Ambroso National Park, and went to a "zoo."
On the first day we went to some waterfalls and enjoyed the sun. Afterwards we went to the a zoo- which wasn't really a zoo. There were 2 cages with monkeys and some birds but for the most part the animals were just running free. There were monkeys, dogs, cats, birds, pigs, horses, and a llama wandering around. I played with some monkeys and got to hold a Macaw.
Hannah has all the pictures of me with monkeys on my shoulder and in my lap. Two monkeys climbed into my lap and kept grabbing my hands and making me pet them. It was hilarious and adorable.
In Samaipata it's hard to do any hiking or activities without hiring a guide. The following day we took a 5 hr hiking tour through Ambroso National park to see the gigantic ferns and get back into nature (too many cities). It was really beautiful.
That night we caught the semi-cama night bus to Sucre. There are two types of buses you can take in Bolivia (and in other South American countries): semi-cama and Cama. The Semi-cama's are the cheaper option; seats don't recline as much, not as comfortable seats, etc. The overnight bus I mentioned earlier is the bus we took to Sucre. We were lucky that it wasn't that bad (only really bumpy).
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