In Cordoba

Distance Mendoza - Cordoba: 675 km, 11 hours on the bus, cost: 30 pounds. The bus was nice and clean but not comfortable, the seats didn't fold down much. However, I slept all the night and I woke up in Cordoba. I took taxi to my host's flat, he was at work so his lovely sister Mercedes opened the door for me. She looks very Argentinian. Her boyfriend twisted ankle while playing tennis, had an operation and has his leg in a cast so he can't work at the moment. He is a carpenter and has his own business. My host Cristian sleeps in his girlfriend's house so I can sleep in his room.
When I arrived in the flat at 9 am Mercedes had to come back to work. She works in a hospital as a chemist and she came home just to open the door for me. I lied down just for "20 minutes" to have a rest... and I woke up at 4 pm... I quickly went to the town centre to see where I was. I met Lionel from Couch Surfing (in the picture) who took me on a very cultural ride, starting from the preparation of "mate". Lionel works for Fiat in administration.
When he invited me to drink mate (which we simply call tea in Europe) I was sure we would go to a bar. I was wrong. We sat on a bench and he took out from his rucksack the mate leaves, thermos with hot water, surgar, silver straw and a small wooden gourd. He quickly prepared mate on the bench. We had three mates each and I have to say it was something I wouldn't drink regularly, it's too strong and bitter. However, this is what Argentinians are famous for, as well as people in Urugway and Paragway. I remember my host Carlos from Santiago de Chile asking me what's the difference between a Chilean and Argentinian on the beach in Viña del Mar. The answer (which I didn't know) was that all the Argentinians have thermoses with them and drink hot mate on the beach :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_(beverage)

Mendoza is very famous for its wine, you can see the vineyards all the way from the Chilean border. The city is very small but clean, safe and pleasant. However the food in bars is pricy (since I left Bolivia I turned to cooking).
In the afternoon I went to Parque Mendoza. It's a huge park with an artificial lake (in the picture: entrance gate to the park). This night I will be travelling to Cordoba.
My pictures from the capital of Chile:
Santiago de Chile

I slept a lot this morning, my body is very tired now. Travelling for 10 months makes you exhausted.
Then I went out with my host Jose', he is a lovely guy. He lives in a big house with three housemates and a cat. He showed me the most interesting places in Mendoza (mainly squares) and.... a dogs market!!! (in the picture). I was talking to ladies who were giving away the puppies. They work for a dogs shelter which looks after homeless dogs. It's so much needed in Chile... well done!
In the evening I bought some food in a supermarket and I cooked a nice meal for all of us. The food in bars and restaurants is just too expensive.

ARGENTINA, In Mendoza

This morning I went to Plaza de Armas again, to post a card for my father. He loves receiving postcards from me. It was my last day in Chile, in the afternoon I left for Argentina.
I spent 150 pounds in 10 days in Chile. Chile is expensive, very European (so different from other
South American countries) and people in Santiago are busy. Although before I came to the city, I thought it was bigger and busier, kind of London but not, nothing like this. You can visit the whole city in one day on foot. What surprised me a lot were dogs. Millions of homeless dogs sleeping like dead in the streets and parks. They rule the cities and towns and they form gangs. Luckily, people respect them and feed them so they are not skinny like in Brazil for example, and they are generally very friendly. Sorry, maybe I talk to much about dogs :)
Spanish that people speak in Chile was the most difficult for me to understand, comparing to other South American countries. Sometimes it sounds like another language.

Santiago de Chile - Mendoza: 341 km, 6 hours on the bus, cost: 15 pounds. The route to the Chilean - Argentinian border is just spectacular. I highly recommend taking bus during the day to be amazed by the range of Andes, high mountains with snow on the summits.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andes
On our minibus I spoke to a guy about earthquakes (my favourite subject in Chile). I learnt so much about earthquakes and how to cope with them. In Santiago the deadly earthquake happened in February this year, the next one is expected in 20 - 25 years. The same in the south of the country. However, the north is preparing for a big one just now. All the government can do is to warn people and to introduce "survival" programmes because the exact date and time are not known. Apparently the best thing to do when it starts is to stand in the entrance door. Inside and outside of the house there is a risk of being hit by falling walls and objects.

In Viña del Mar and Valparaiso

This morning I took a bus to Viña del Mar. I was told that it's the most beautiful city in Chile. I can confirm that it's the most beautiful city I have seen in the country (in the picture). Situated 2 hours from Santiago, at the seaside (Santiago doesn't have access to the sea), clean, with just fantastic tall palm trees (kind of Las Vegas... I saw on TV), cormorans, beautiful houses, nice plants. I immediately felt happy when I started visiting the town.
In Chile, the first time in my trip, I found cheap shops, kind of Primark in London. It's so ironic - in poor countries of South America these shops don't exist, and in countries like Chile or England they do.
I was invited a couple of times for a drink by some rich men, they spotted me walking on my own and told the waiter to call me. I politely refused but I liked that they didn't have problem doing this, like in other countries where men are too shy.
In the late afternoon I took a local bus to Valparaiso, it takes 20 minutes to get there from Viña. Valparaiso is a port city but it's considered a world heritage site because of its beautiful town centre. Although the city is nice, I felt claustrophobic at times because there are a lot of buildings squeezed in small space.
I came back home to Santiago very late and very tired.

Today I went to the museum of Pablo Neruda, a very famous in the world Chilean writer and politician, who I knew from the Italian film "Il Postino".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Neruda
The museum, which was Neruda's house in the past, was interesting.
At home, Carlos asked me if I knew what "caffee with legs" was. My first thought was: coffee with sweets made of cow legs which I tried in Colombia, floating on the coffee surface. I was wrong. It's a way of serving coffee in a famous bar in Santiago - by waitresses in miniskirts. Of course the bar is very popular :)
Later at night I went to a Couch Surfing meeting where I met nice people (in the picture CS Santiago de Chile).

My host Carlos lives right in the centre of Santiago, in a beautiful building. His flat is on the 17th floor (wow, that's high!!). He said that during the scary earthquake in February this year he thought his life was going to end. Everything was shaking and living on the 17th floor made things even worse. His flat was swinging from one side to another, Carlos was holding onto a wall convinced that the building was going to collapse.
I would really like to experience a little earthquake, just a little one.... so I am waiting.
There is a drink called terremoto (earthquake). The story is that a German tourist asked for a glass of white wine in a bar. The wine came warm, not cold as white wine should be. So he asked for a scoop of pineaple ice-cream to make the wine cooler. After drinking it he said that there was a real terremoto in his head. Since then, terremoto has been a popular drink in Santiago. I think Chile is known in the world for these things:
1. earthquakes
2. wine (on the second place as for example Polish people don't drink much wine so they are more familiar with Chilean earthquakes than wine)
3. copper mines and the resent accident when miners were trapped underground for over 2 months

This afternoon I went to the city centre again. To be honest Santiago seems to be all shops, sqares and parks (in the picture - in Cerro Santa Lucia, a nice park on a hill with a view over the city). I don't think there are many tourists in Santiago and if they are it's not easy to see them, like in other cities. Maybe it's because Chile is expensive so people prefer to go to Peru or Bolivia. For this reason I am being hussled a lot by men.
I was upset to hear about the accident which happened last night - a bus hit truck on the motorway near Santiago, killing 19 people. I remember that my travel buddy, who was looking after me on the bus to Santiago, advised me not to travel with Tur Bus company because they have many accidents. Wow, he just said this yesterday and short time later this horrible accident happens.
Here are my pictures from Antofagasta:
Antofagasta

In Santiago de Chile

Last night I took a bus to Santiago. Antofagasta - Santiago: 1360 km, 18 hours on the bus, cost: 23.50 pounds (in the picture: on the road).
The bus was comfortable and for the first time in ages I slept a lot on the bus. Chile as a well-developed country has good roads, unlike Bolivia or Peru where it was just impossible to sleep on buses because of bumpy roads.
A guy sitting next to me was coming back home from work in a mine in Calama. He was the most caring person I have met on a bus in my whole trip, making sure that I wasn't cold at night and that I felt comfortable all the time. In the morning he bought me coffee and biscuits. If he knew how much he contributed to my positive impression of Chile through these little actions.... In the morning we were talking a lot about earthquakes, politics and travelling.
I arrived in Santiago at 2 pm, left my rucksack in the station and I am visiting the city centre now. My Couch Surfing host is coming back from work at 7.30 pm. The first thing I noticed in Santiago was the temperature. It's as hot as I like it to be. Finally, after months of mixed weather and cold nights, it's very hot. Hurrrahhhh!!!....
My pictures from two towns in the north part of Chile:
San Pedro de Atacama and Calama

I met Shirley's sister and her friend, they just arrived in Antofagasta. We all visited La Portada yesterday. It is a bunch of stones in the sea forming a beautiful gate (in the picture). Apparently this is what Antofagasta is famous for. It takes 30 minutes to get to La Portada, driving from the city through the desert. It is a very beautiful spot.
We also went to a seafood market and I bought huge mussles. Right by the market you can see sea lions, happily swimming in the sea. They are big and have funny faces :)
Than I went to a supermarket with Jorge (if you ask me what place I visited the most in Antofagasta, the answer will be Jumbo supermarket ha ha ha...). At night I cooked my speciality: mussles in tomato-cider sauce. We had a lot of fun while eating them as they were really big and some were difficult to open.

Yesterday we did shopping and then Jorge took me on a motorbike ride outside of the city. I enjoyed it a lot, few times we did over 150 km/h (in the picture after the ride).
At night I cooked a lovely omlette and I went out with Jorge to a local bar. It was birthday of his four friends. People were smoking, unfortunately in Chile you can smoke inside bars and clubs. I have to say that Chilean men are tall and good looking, they are my second favourite in South America, after Venezuelans.

Yesterday I went for a walk at the seaside. The seaside in Antofagasta is not especially beautiful but I was just happy to smell the sea. I love the smell of sea. There is one small beach in the middle of the city (in the picture), it is nice and the water is clean. Small beach but it brings a lot of happiness to people.
I met Shirley when she finished work in the afternoon. It was her last day in this fast food place. On Monday she and Jorge are opening a bar with Colombian food. I witnessed problems they are experiencing to open the bar but I hope that at the end everything will go smoothly and the business will be a great success.
I visited the city center with Shirley, it is nice but nothing special. Antofagasta is a mine city, not a tourist city.
In the evening Jorge cooked a delicious meal and then we were listening to lambada songs....

In Antofagasta

Distance Calama - Antofagasta: 215 km, 3 hours on the bus, cost: 5 pounds.
In the morning I went for a walk in Calama. There are so many homeless dogs in the town, more than I have ever seen in my life before, with exception of Bucarest in Romania. My heart was bleeding when I saw them sleeping in the streets and eating from the rubbish bins.
At 4 pm I took an extremely comfortable bus which crossed Atacama desert again.
When I arrived in the bus station in Antofagasta, I experienced a nightmare Couch Surfing situation (second of this kind in my trip). My host who I spoke to a day before and who confirmed that he would be waiting for me, wasn't answering phone all day. I was wandering in the bus station for 3 hours, phoning him every 10 minutes. Then I got angry. I went to internet cafe, found a number of another guy from CS who I had contacted before too, and I phoned him. Somehow, Jorge wasn't surprised that I was calling. He said I could stay in his flat and that he was going to pick me up in 10 minutes.
So I sat on the floor, very tired, and after a short while a girl approached me and asked: "Aga?". It was Shirley from Cali, Colombia!! I recognised her from her profile picture, I sent her an email a day before asking if she would like to have coffee with me in Antofagasta. It appeared that she rents a room in Jorge's flat. Such a coincidence :) My mood changed immediately, I felt I was in good hands.
On the same evening I went with Shirley to a jewellery shop of her friends, to put up Christmas decorations (in the picture - they needed somebody tall :)). Oh my god... is it Christmas yet? I don't feel the atmosphere at all, where is the snow??...
Few hours later, owners of the shop invited Shirley and me to a bar for dinner and drinks. I had Peruvian pisco sour and peach sour; both food and the drinks were lovely. At one point a drunk guy introduced himself to me and asked if I needed help. He wanted to phone Polish consulate or Chilean government... ha ha ha ha... No, I definitely didn't need help :)
Next batch of my pictures:
3-day trip to the Bolivian desert

In Calama

Distance San Pedro de Atacama - Calama: 95 km, 1.5 hours on the bus, cost: 2 pounds. Thomas was travelling with me but this night he is going back to Peru, to catch his plane to France. Travelling through Atacama desert is wonderful although it depends on the area. It is amazing to see dunes but it can be very boring if there is flat area for a long time.
When we arrived in Calama, I went to meet my hosts who live 5 minutes from the bus station and from the town centre. They are a lovely family, very talkative and full of energy. There is nothing to see in the town really, I am just stopping to have a rest and obviously the family is a great experience for me.
I introduced Thomas to the family. They invited us to eat with them but at the end it was Thomas and I who bought food in a supermarket and cooked. The food was Thomas' idea and it was absolutely delicious (in the picture Thomas in action). Then we sat in the kitchen, talking for ages, until Thomas had to catch his bus at night. The Family is great. The mother and father who are in their 60's recently went on a trip to Argentina and Urugway, doing Couch Surfing. Isn't it amazing?...
Some facts about the north part of Chile:
- it is very rich in minerals such as copper, iron, nitrates
- the biggest in the world open copper mine is situated 16 km from Calama. I was going to visit the mine but the tour was fully booked for the next 5 days
http://www.visitchile.com/eng/atacama-desert-altiplano/destination.asp?id=100
- there are many earthquakes, every day, just that most of them are unnoticeable. It is better when they are small and frequent so they don't accumulate resulting in one deadly earthquake
- Atacama desert is the driest places in the world. The Family told me the last time they experienced little rain 4 years ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atacama_Desert
- it was Chile - Urugway football match at night. Chile won 2:0. People in bars got crazy :)
My pictures from the capital of Bolivia:
La Paz

CHILE, In San Pedro de Atacama

I spent 143 pounds in 10 days in Bolivia. It included 3-day trip to the desert which cost 70 pounds, all the rest was very cheap. The country surprised me, before I came here I had a picture of Bolivia in my head: a poor rural mountain country... I found out there are salt flats, desert, islands, lagoons, beautiful capital and nice people. However, the country is far behind other South American countries in regards to hygene, communication, organisation and education. For example it is difficult to find fast internet connection in La Paz, or Skype. All the computers are old and dirty.
I feel I need a change now. After Peru and Bolivia I need a higher standard of life and apparently this is what Chile and Argentina can offer me.

Thomas and I left our wonderful jeep team and we took a bus to San Pedro de Atacama (in the picture). Surprisingly, the bus ticket was included in the price of the desert trip.
It took us 2 hours to get to San Pedro, a town in the middle of Atacama desert. When you cross the border, you are not allowed to carry coca leaves and fruits with you. If you do it, you will have problems with the police and you will be fined 200 dollars.
When we arrived in the town, we found a nice hotel. I started writing my blog and Thomas fell asleep. San Pedro is very small, there is nothing to do apart from many activities in the desert. We spent 3 days in the desert, driving miles on the sand from one place to another so we need to rest from the desert at the moment :)

Day 3

We woke up at 4 am (ouch ouch ouch!!!..). It was very cold at night, everyone slept in clothes and hats. I slept only one hour, the cold kept me awake. We woke up so early because we wanted to see geysers on the altitiude of almost 5000 meters above the sea level. You can see them only early in the morning, later in the day the steam becomes invisible. It was freezing cold up there (-7 degrees).
After that we visited thermal springs and we dipped in the hot water (in the picture - I loved it). The temperature of the water was 30 - 35 degrees. The temperature outside was much lower... Somebody shouted my name in the springs... I turned my head and I saw Barbara who I had met on the trip from Copacabana to Island of Sun on Lake Titicaca, a week ago :)
Then we went to see an amazing green lagoon (this time the water seemed to be green) and then the driver gave me lift to the Chilean border. Thomas joined me, all other people carried on to a city in eastern Bolivia and then to Argentina.

Day 2

We woke up at 6 am (ouuuch!!...) and after breakfast we left. We had many great conversations in the car before we arrived in the place with unique in the world tombs. People used to be burried in these beautiful little caves, you can see their skeletons. The tombs are unique, as well as the salt houses and hotels, and they are situated in the middle of a desert called Sinoli. I loved the place, there was so much space around. I felt the vastness of space and I was happy. I thought that I could do anything I wanted with my life, nothing was impossible. Usually you feel small in the face of powerful but immensely silent nature... I felt incredibly strong.
After that we visited an active vulcano, amazing rocks in the desert and four beautiful lagoons with flamingos living peacefully in the region (in the picture at the first lagoon). I wanted to take a picture of my bare feet, dirty from the smelly mud due to its high sulphur content. I was looking for a position of my body with no shadow, I mean in Europe you have shadow on one side and no shadow on the other side of your body. After short confusion I realised that it was not possible - my feet were always in shadow.
There was a lot of dust in the desert. I always feel dirty in cities due to dust but never in deserts. In deserts I feel very integrated with the nature and dust is a part of the nature.

The last (fourth) lake is in a national park. The colour of the lake is intensive red due to a special kind of algea. The beautiful red colour disappears before the sunset so we were in a hurry to get to the park for 4 pm. We left our luggage in a 6-bed room and we went for a long walk. The area and lake are great. On the way back there was a strong freezing wind, very unpleasant.
When we were having tea in our hotel, Nadia and Lisabeth told us what happened to them in La Paz. They got on a taxi. Two more people got on before it even moved and one of them said he was a policeman, and he asked them for passports and money. The girls were confused and they said they had left everything in their hotel. So the policeman searched their rucksacks. The girls were looking at what he was doing all the time but when they returned to the hotel, their photo cameras were not in the rucksacks any more....

Later in the night, at the dining table, I heard two people speak Polish!! It was Kasia and Robert from Warsaw. We had a nice chat but unfortunately not very long as our drivers wanted to sleep and their rooms were by the dining room. It was getting freezing cold too.
When I told the Polish guys about my death experience they both asked, shocked "....so why didn't you come back home??" ha ha ha....

Day 1

We booked the trip to find out what the southwest part of Bolivia can offer and we were especially interested to see the salt desert. Our jeep left at 10.30 am with six passengers: a lovely American couple Molly and Barry, two Danish girls Nadia and Lisabeth, Thomas and I. We made a great team during these three days, as great as my Machu Picchu team.
On the first day we visited some tourist attractions of the region, including an astonishing island in the middle of the salt flats. It was full of huge cactuses (up to few meters high) which I have never seen in my life before (in the picture). We climbed the cactuses hill and as I was in an excellent company, I enjoyed myself a lot.
We arrived in our hotel in Villa Candelaria at 6 pm and after dumping our rucksacks in the rooms, we visited the village. Then we had dinner; Barry opened a very nice Bolivian wine which he bought in the morning. There are solar panels in Villa Candelaria and electricity is available only from 7 pm to 10 pm so we spent some time in the candle light, so great :) Our hotel, as all other buildings in the region, was made entirely of salt blocks. Such a fantastic experience...

In Uyuni

Distance La Paz - Uyuni: 546 km, 12 hours on the bus, cost: 8 pounds (so expensive!!). This was the worst bus ride in my whole trip. The bus was very old (as everything in Bolivia) and it was very cold at night (not because of air conditioning but the desert temperature outside). There was a child crying at night and a drunk orchestra group sitting behing us and playing radio loudly. One of the orchestra members vomited in the isle and on our seats. Luckily, we had moved to the front of the bus five minutes before it happened. We - I mean myself and Thomas from France, who I met at the bus station. Due to the circumstances we weren't able to sleep all the night. We arrived in Uyuni at 7 am with intention of having a good sleep in a hotel. But after breakfast we felt better and we decided to book a 3-day trip to the salt flats and desert. We are leaving in an hour. There is nothing to do in very small Uyuni.

I felt very bad all day yesterday but today, although very weak, I decided not to waste time and to do some visiting. I caught a bus which took me to another mirador in the other part of the city, the view was amazing again.
Being hosted by Rosalia has been fantastic. She is a great person, with a great heart and she knows life a lot. We spent hours talking and talking. She would never think about taking money from me for food or drink, and when I had food poisoning, she was cleaning my vomit from the floor and making me hundreds of cups of tea. Then she was scared to give me food from her restaurant as she didn't want to be responsible for making my sickness worse. I will always remember this little Bolivian angel.
In the picture: in front of Rosalia's restaurant.
I am leaving for Uyuni this night. I like La Paz althought I couldn't live here due to dirt and chaos. The Couch Surfing community is small and inactive. I posted a message on the CS website proposing a meetup but I had no answer.

Yesterday I went to a birthday party in Antonio's second restaurand. From the very beginning I felt that the people were unusually spiritual, and I quickly understood that it was a Hare Krishna party. The birthday girl was Magdalena from Colombia, Bogota' (in the picture). She just moved from Bogota' to La Paz to be with her boyfriend from Argentina. When we met, she said: "I saw you in the centre of La Paz yesterday!!" ha ha ha...
All the people were very nice at the party. I used to attend Hare Krishna prayers and festivals many years ago in Poland so I knew that environment.
They made two cakes. One was edible but the other one, which looked like a rich creamy chocolate cake, was absolutely disgusting. It was sugar and gluten free, it had too much flax seeds and it tasted like sand. I was looking at people's faces when they were eating it just to confirm that they were thinking the same. They were.

I woke up in the middle of the night with a very bad food poisoning. I am not going to say what I was doing all the night because you don't want to know. I haven't slept and eaten since. Well, it was expected, wasn't it?

I love people from La Paz. Today I finally met my host Antonio, who came back from the mountains where he was introducing eco-lifestyle in a village. He took me to a fruit market, showed me and made me taste some fruits and vegetables I didn't know (for example tumbo fruit).
I feel a lot of good energy in the city, I think it is because all the people I have met are honest. The weather got much better too, and it is not cold at all - it is hot during the day and cool at night.
This afternoon I went to Puente de las Americas and to a mirador (a bridge and a view point, in the picture). It was great, the view was amazing.
My pictures from Puno in Peru and Copacabana in Bolivia:
Lake Titicaca

This morning Rosalia brought me a huge bowl of fruits for breakfast. I really want to believe that it is her generosity and she won't give me a bill at the end of my stay in her house. I am embarraced to have these thoughts but after visiting Peru you just have them.
We talked a lot again - she told me some stories from her childhood. She comes from a poor Peruvian family, her father is a carpenter who lost seven fingers at work. Her mother works very hard on land and in the kitchen. Rosalia never had expensive toys - the most precious ones were dolls made of bread.

Then I went to the historic centre (in the picture Plaza Murillo with the cathedral behind, residence of the president Evo Morales and the dreadful pigeons). I like and I don't like La Paz at the same time. It is like with Cali, I love and I hate it at the same time. I don't like La Paz because it is dirty, polluted, chaotic, grey and sad. I like it because the people seem to be extremely nice and polite, and they don't try to cheat you (well, it is my personal experience). For this reason I feel relaxed and I love to feel relaxed. La Paz also seems to be safe because nobody warns me to avoid some places, as it happened in other countries.
I am praying not to get any stomach bug (and not to go to a hospital again). The level of hygine is very scary.
Finally I got money from my insurance company for my stolen camera and today I have sent another form to claim the medical expenses from Cusco. I also went to a hairdresser (2.50 pounds for a Bolivian cut :)) and tomorrow I will be looking for a massage studio. I deserve to spoil myself in La Paz.
Just for comparison, prices from Copacabana and LP: dinner in Cop 15 bolivianos, in LP 7 bolivianos; internet in Cop 10 bolivianos, in LP 2 bolivianos.

In La Paz

Distance: Copacabana - La Paz: 155 km, 3.5 hours on the bus, cost: 2.30 pounds.
The nightlife in Copacabana is non-existent. The town is not prepared for tourists at all. Everything apart from three restaurants was closed early at night. Which was good for me - I had a really good rest in the beautiful room.
My bus to La Paz left at 2 pm (in the picture - waiting for the bus which was half an hour late). Right before I got on the bus, I realised I had no money left. Luckily I bought the bus ticket two days before. I went to the bank but it opens at 2.30 pm every day. There is no cash machine in the town so there was no way I could get the money out. I had nothing to eat and drink until I arrived in La Paz at 5.30 pm....
We had to cross Lake Titicaca to get to La Paz, travellers on one boat and the bus on a different boat. I went to the driver and told him I had no money at all (in which he probably didn't believe, he thought that a rich girl from Europe tried not to pay 15 pence for the boat trip). Eventually, when I showed him my empty wallet, he agreed to smuggle me on the bus.
When I arrived to La Paz I phoned my host. Well, first I found a cash machine, took money out and I bought a lot of food - I was so hungry... Then I phoned Rosalia. She is a sister of my host Antonio. He is not in the city at the moment so Rosalia was told to look after me. They live in their restaurant, I mean it is restaurant downstairs and they sleep in a very small space upstairs. I am going to share a room with Rosalia and her nephew. The restaurant and upstairs area are very basic and a little bit dirty but it doesn't matter to me. Rosalia is wonderful. We spent 4 hours talking when I arrived, she made sandwiches for me and gave me some food from the restaurant at night. Rosalia is 45 years old, she moved to La Paz seven years ago with her two brothers. They opened this vegetarian restaurant which I think is doing well. They are originally from Peru, from Arequipa which I visited. Rosalia was very interested to hear about Polish food and I am going to teach her few things, for example beetroot soup, which she could serve in her restaurant. She is in love at the moment, she met a guy just 4 months ago and now she is thinking about a child. She was told by a doctor (her brother) that it is not too late, she can still do it in the next couple of years. I also met Rosalia's sister in law. She is very shy with me, unlike her 11-year old son who is asking me all the time to say something in Polish, English or Italian :)

Our boat trip started at 8.30 am. We visited Island of the Sun - the main island on the Bolivian side of the lake. There is also Island of the Moon but it is tiny and not many trips go there. On the boat I saw Nadia (the girl I shared a room with in Puno) and her friend. I also met Barbara from Canada with whom I spent some time walking up island hills (in the picture). Unfortunately I had to head back quickly as I my lungs hurt and I became dizzy. Barbara continued the walk as she wanted to visit some ruins.
The boat trip was very relaxing again. I like Lake Titicaca very much, it is one of my favourite places I have visited in my trip.

BOLIVIA, In Copacabana

Distance Puno - Copacabana: 146 km, 3 hours on the bus, cost: 1.75 pounds.
The custom control on both sides was very easy and stress free, nothing like Ecuadorian - Peruvian border. When we arrived, a man from our bus recomended a hotel so all the people followed him to this hotel (what a great commission he got!!). I was the only person who had a look at the room and then I went to ask in other hotels for price and conditions. I asked in about 7 hotels, saw the rooms and at the end I came back to the first hotel which seemed to be the cheapest and the best. I have a big room with two beds, TV and a view over Titicaca. All this for 2.19 pounds a night. I already love Bolivian prices, I think Bolivia is a country for me :) I paid 1.32 pounds for a big lunch and 1.75 for a boat trip on Titicaca tomorrow.
The beach in Copacabana (in the picture) is beautiful but there is a lot of rubbish... such a pity!! Just like Copacabana in Brazil... People don't swim in the water because it is too dirty and too cold.
The town doesn't have a single cash machine, to get the money out you have to go to the only bank and pay 5% commission. It looks like this town is new to the tourism industry.

The boat trip on Lake Titicaca was so relaxing... it was EXACTLY what I needed after the horror I went through.
Puno is a very nice lake town on the Peruvian side. The lake is huge (seems to be sea when you are on a boat) and it is the highest lake in the world, situated on the altitude of 3811 meters above the sea level.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Titicaca
We visited two main islands: Uros and Taquile. Uros is amazing. It is artificially created by people, by putting together floating reeds so the whole island can be moved to another place, if needed. Taquile reminded me of Sicily, very beautiful but not much different than other islands in south of Europe.
The temperature changes a lot during the day. It is very warm in the afternoon and very cold at night.

Tomorrow I am leaving for Bolivia, to a town on the Bolivian side of Titicaca. Peru is very beautiful but what I don't like is that everything is about money and ripping off tourists, as never before in my trip.
I just would like to warn travellers: Couch Surfers in Peru have a lot of negative references, again - as never before in countries I visited. Please read the profiles carefully. I was extremely lucky with my hosts however on few occasions I wish I could have relaxed and trusted people more.
I have spent 330 pounds in almost a month in Peru. It includes travel between 5 cities, trip to Machu Picchu (69 pounds), 2 nights in a hotel (8 pounds), day boat trip on Titicaca (9 pounds), eating food in cheap restaurants all the time, internet, laundry, trip to Copacabana in Bolivia, 22 pounds gone as I was given fake money.

In Puno, Lake Titicaca

Thank you so much to all the people who sent me these wonderful emails and messages. I am sure that reading them and the fact that you were thinking about me contributed to my quick recovery.
I left the clinic on my own request despite my doctor insisting that I stay under observation for few more days. I am not sure if it was because of my health condition or the mountains of money I was leaving in the clinic.
I paid 1,900 pounds for saving my life (diagonsis, 2 nights of intensive care, tests, medications).
I feel very weak and dizzy now but I want to leave Cusco this morning and move on. New life, new adventures...

Distance Cusco - Puno: 390 km, 7 hours on the bus, cost: 6 pounds. The route was very rural. There was no desert any more, just hills and some random primitive villages.
I met a girl on the bus. She lives in Holland, she is half Moroccan and half Chinese (interesting combination). We share a room in a nice hotel (3 pounds each). We went for a walk in the town this evening. There is a festival in Puno at the moment however I haven't found out yet what they are celebrating (in the picture).
Tomorrow I am doing a boat trip on Lake Titicaca.
Next batch of my pictures:
Cusco, Machu Picchu

I looked death in the eye...

I looked death in the eye (one more time on this continent). She came but I didn't want to go.
Let's start from the beginning. On Monday evening I felt bad, I had stomach and lower abdomen pain. I haven't felt especially well in Cusco due to lack of oxygen, and I had this kind of pain before. However, this time I knew it was more serious. I went to a 24-hour pharmacy at 1 am, when the pain was unsupportable. I explained my symptoms to the pharmacist and I got antibiotics. As my doctor told me later, the antibiotics were good for the symptoms I had, unfortunately I was alergic to two main ingredients. I was never alergic to anything in my life, apart from having a mild hayfever. I came back home and 15 minutes after taking the first tablet, my face swole. It did swell so much that I hardly could see - the whole area around my eyes was swollen. Then it came strong heart and stomach pain. I managed to get to Jhoel's room, luckily he was at home. When he saw my face, he got very scared, I looked like a monster. I went to the bathroom, he followed me. I set on the toilet and this was the moment when I saw death. I whispered to Jhoel "no quiero morir... I don't want to die..." and I started intensively thinking about my father in Poland who wouldn't survive my death and about friends close to my heart. I wanted to see them again. I strongly focused on these thoughts and I think they saved me.
My heart was beating slower and slower... until I didn't have a pulse any more.

I lost consciousness in Jhoel's arms. I had a beautiful dream - I was walking on the grass with some people, they were probably friends. I could see all their bodies apart from heads. I felt good and comfortable, we were laughing. The weather was fantastic, it was very warm and we walked towards a big light on the very blue sky, which in my dream I thought was sun emitting the wormth.
When I regained consciousness, Jhoel was all shaking, he was strongly slapping my face and resuscitating me for several minutes. He called neighbours, ambulance and the police. The ambulance never arrived so the police quickly gave me a lift to a private clinic. When we arrived I couldn't walk at all so I was given a wheelchair. They took me somewhere, to a room, and suddenly a lot of people started running around me. Two doctors diagnosed me with intoxication. I couldn't see any more - I was seeing only shapes of the people. All the rest was dark grey, like in a broken black and white TV. I tried to force myself to see but it didn't work. The doctors injected me with a lot of drugs and gave me a big dose of adrenaline as I still didn't have a pulse...
I vomited. My consciousness was on and off. After all the hard work of these people to save my life, they put me on a bed and pushed it to my room. I was spasmatically shaking with cold although it wasn't cold in the hospital. Jhoel was panically running around the bed, trying to put clothes on me and to find blankets.
I was admitted to the hospital at 3.30 am, Jhoel stayed with me for a while and he came back in the morning. When he came back, he asked for my family phone numbers, in case they would have to fly over to say goodby. What he said made me think even more about my father and friends.

The next day I had a chat with my doctor (well, I couldn't really talk as my throat was very narrow). He said that I had an extremely strong reaction to the medication I had bought and that I got to the hospital right on time, when little oxygen was still getting to my brain. Alergy to a medication (or anything else) causes skin itching which I also experienced, and body swelling. Your throat and the whole airway closes and eventually the brain doesn't get oxygen, this is the end.
I was lying in the intensive care unit, the monitor was ticking laudly to let the doctor know that my heart was beating. I still felt pain in the heart and stomach but the swell went down a little bit on the second day.

I find it very ironic - I have met a lot of travellers who were hospitalised in Ecuador or Peru because they ate ceviche - raw seafood, and they got really ill afterwards. Ceviche is a delicacy in these two countries but I had just one small portion in Manta, in Ecuador, because I didn't want to end up in a hospital....

I know my experience is very scary but I always see the bright side - I am learning how to appreciate life and I am hoping that my life will change for better because of the experience.
Another thing is (that surprises me a lot !) that if something like this happens to me, I consider it normal. I don't feel pity for myself and I don't think about coming back to Europe. I just move on with my life/travel and very quickly I forget about what happened. I am incredibly proud of myself for this kind of approach to the situations.
In the picture: having rest after the big shock.