This was the most memorable day of the entire summer. This blog doesn't do the day justice because it was 2 years ago. Also I'm a terrible writer. First I want to talk about our "breakfast crew": Myself; my roomate Blake; our friend Melissa; Vince, from NY who was living in Chile, a swiss guy who had been living in Argentina; a guy from England; a girl from Austria. So here goes...
After heading to Copacabana to escape all the politcal unrest in La Paz, we decided it was time to leave Bolivia. We had missed the Saltar and climbing Potosi. And now we heard that alcohol sales were going to be suspended for the weekend because of elections. It was definately time to say adios to Bolivia. We went and set up our bus tickets for the next morning.
I think we paid like $20US for the trip to Cuzco in a large comfy bus. We were set! We spent the afternoon doing some last minute shopping, trying to spend up some of our bolivianos. Little did we know this was a bad idea...
The next morning we were having breakfast at one of the hostels in town. We were hanging out in the courtyard, talking with some other people who were also leaving today. Then we started hearing rumors of a transportation strike in Bolivia. Then in Peru. Oh shit. We're about to get stuck here, my roomate mumbled to me. Dont get me wrong, Copa was a cool place, but after 3 or 4 days, you run out of stuff to do. Especially if theres no booze! So our breakfast table banded together to go catch a bus out of this place. When we got to the pick up, no bus.
Hmm... We were told the bus was stopped at the border, and not allowed to cross, but that they had some small ones coming to take us. By this time, there was around 100 people or so standing around yelling in their respective languages. So a van that holds maybe 12 people pulls up next to us and is swarmed by the crowd. Our breakfast crew started loading our bags on top along with everyone else. We realized that more bags were going up than people would fit, so we all rushed in and secured a spot. Finally, we were good. Once on we were told we had to pay another 50 bolivianos because of the circumstances. Blake and I somehow came up with enough by adding bolivianos, dollars, and peruvian sols we had just tradded for. Just as we were about to leave, a group of angry israeli guys stood in front of our bus, refusing to move.
They obviously didn't understand the whole first come first serve deal. So amidst yelling profanities, physically trying to drag our driver out of the seat, and trying to steal our keys, Vince the guy in the passenger seat was smart enough to grab the keys. Its a good thing Blake and I were in the very back, because we had had enough of Bolivia, and if kicking a couple asses was what it was gonna take to leave then thats what we were gonna do. We probably would still be in jail down there. Haha. So we head out finally, and we are making progress!
We get dropped off at the border and get our exit stamps. Walk over to Peru. Finally its over. We made it. It was still early and the Peruvian transportation strike started the next day. Then again, no buses.
Our trusty guide that had been with us assured us that we had a bus coming. Then finally, another van. So we load up our bags and hop on. Our guide informs us we have to pay another fee. Our group started arguing but we realized that we didnt really have a choice in the matter. So we paid, this time in Sols thankfully, and again we were off. About an hour into the trip we were told we were gonna have to change buses again in a town called Llave. As we were coming up on Llave our bus started swerving off of the road. When I looked back, I noticed that there was boulders in the road. Must be part of the strike tomorrow, I thought. Then right outside the town, our bus stopped. We got out and of course, there wasnt a bus there. Our guide told us we had to walk through the town, because no buses were allowed.
Looks like the strike started early! So we grabbed our bags and started walking... We walked through the main road in town on display to all the locals, who were trying to sell us everything from drinks to rides on motorcycles. I refused to spend any money out of principle there, since they thought it was funny I was walking through the heat, with my pack on. 8Km laters we found our bus to Puno! We got on and to our suprise, no extra fees! After we started driving again, our driver came up to us asking if we were going all the way to Cuzco. We told him yes, and he said it we would be cutting it close, but we would be fine as long as we didnt run into any trouble. He got on his phone and started organizing. We weren't really sure what was going on, but as long as we were heading into Peru and not towards Bolivia it was progress.
We made it to Puno much sooner than we thought, so our driver had some cars pick us up and take us to a hotel ran by his friend. From there, he organized us a hotel in Cuzco for $3 dollars a night!!! Holy crap, it was about time our luck turned around... if he was for real. We were paying him in Puno, not Cuzco. But for 3 bucks I'll take the chance. After that our group went and grabbed some dinner. I dont remember the restaurant's name, but it was really nice. At dinner, all everyone could talk about was how crazy the day had been/is. After dinner, we hit up the ATM and headed to the bus station. After tipping our guide for getting us from Copa, we got on our night bus to Cuzco. Everyone climbed in their seats, bundled up in sleeping bags (since the temp had dropped to near freezing since our little hike earlier).
Thinking we were about to get some sleep, a group of young boys hopped on our bus as we pulled out and started singing and dancing up and down the isles! After 16 hours of travel, we all wanted a little sleep. They got off a few miles down the road, and we finally got some shut eye.
The rest of the story is pretty boring. We made it to Cuzco. Our cabs were waiting. And our hotel was $3 for the night, AND they were already paid for... What a day.
