La Rotonda

At the end of our tour to the Salar de Uyuni we were dropped in the town of Uyuni. It didn't look to promising and as I wasn't to keen on hanging out with the rest of my group for the day (they were all catching a nightbus to La Paz) I decided to just take the next bus to Potosi and see if I can make my way from there to Sucre or if I would have to stay there for the night.
We arrived in Potosi around 7pm. I had met a french couple on the bus and they also wanted to go to Sucre. Unfortunately it turned out the busses to Sucre were leaving from another terminal. But it was supposed to be in walking distance. When we left the terminal we had to cross a parking lot where lots of cars were waiting to take people to Sucre. Everybody came running to us trying to hassle us into their cars. Normally I would have ignored them but as I was pretty tired already after the tour and 4 hours on the bus from Uyuni to Potosi I was at least considering this option. We talked a guy down to 25,- bolivianos (€ 3,-) and jumped in his car. First he wanted to wait for another person but after a while he couldn't be bothered himself to wait any longer. I had expected a lot worse from the streets in Bolivia after what people had told me. The road to Sucre was actually pretty good with barriers and illuminated road markings almost all the way. The driver drove quickly but not irresponsible. We arrived to Sucre around 10pm and the driver conveniently dropped us at the main square instead of at the bus terminal.
From here I walked a few minutes to the "Kultur Berlin". A hostel Yves had recommended to me in Arequipa. I hadn't made a reservation but luckily they had a bed available. I dropped my stuff and changed into fresh clothes (I was still wearing my layers from the tour in Uyuni). I wanted to use the WIFI as I hadn't really had a chance in a few days so I went back down. The hostel rooms were set a long a gallery above a courtyard which was a public restaurant. The setting was nice but somehow it was hard to make out who was a hostel guest a who was just visiting the restaurant. While I was sitting by myself I was wondering if this was the most social hostel. But it turned out the next morning my worries were unnecessary. During breakfast it was easy to meet other guests and I just sat down with a bunch of people who all had just arrived to the hostel and they recommended I should join then for the walking tour around town. The breakfast by the way was amazing! A buffet with different kinds of bread, jam, some cheese, tomatoes, different kinds of cereals, yoghurt, a lot of fresh cut fruits, juices, tea and coffee. Definitely the best free breakfast in a hostel so far. The walking tour was all right. The most impressive part was a system of tunnels connecting different churches in town. Apparently they used to be a secret meeting space for priest and nuns and lots of dead fetuses have been found here. On the tour I met Jeanine and Dianne from Holland and Andy and Harry from Austria. After the tour we went to the market for lunch together and from now on we basically spend all our time together. We spend the day strolling around town. There are some really good but cheap chocolate stores in Sucre where we bought some nice chocolates. Would be a nice souvenir to bring home but as it would probably melt we decided to eat them all.
We were hanging out in the main square watching busy gardeners doing their important jobs like cutting and watering plants (never in a rush and always with a high attention to detail) for a while. A kid convinced Harry that his shoes needed cleaning and he let him do this job. It was impressive watching the kid work with professional moves but I still felt bad supporting kids working.
We booked a horse riding trip for the next day and had dinner at our hostel. After dinner they showed traditional dances which were quite nice to watch. After this the whole thing transformed into a party pretty quick. On the weekends the hostel had a club as well. It was fun dancing again. Maybe I'm not completely against party hostels after all ;)
I went to bed around 2:30 but even though the club was in a separated room and not in the main court yard the music was still super loud in the rooms. But luckily by now when I'm tired I just go to sleep whatever is happening around me.
The next morning we got ready for our horseback ride. Harry stomach wasn't happy so he didn't feel up to it but the rest of us jumped in a car that drove us a little out of town to what looked like the poorer outskirts. We met our guide who assigned us horses according to our level of experience and off we went. My horse was called Suri. He was a pinto and really nice to control even when we went faster.
Dianne and me were the most experienced but Andy had also been riding horses for about a year when he was younger. Jeanine was the only one who didn't feel completely confident being on a horse but in the end she also managed and I hope she could still enjoy it a little. We went up in the mountains surrounding Sucre and had nice views of the city and the nature. We got of the horses for a little lunch break before heading back to where we started on a different route.
In the afternoon we went to a huge market a little out of the center. It was covering a lot of streets and you could basically get everything here. We bought matching friendship bracelets for all 5 of us - friends forever.
For dinner we went to a taco restaurant that where we could again observe the fascinating way of work here. There were around 6 or 7 people behind the counter all having an assigned task - and they would never fail to do exactly that without getting in a rush. One girl was standing behind everybody not taking her eyes away from her phone. You might have thought she wasn't working but when someone run out of ingredients it was her who got more!
Later we went to a bar where we ended up playing kings cup for quite a while 😅 I felt pretty tired so when we were heading back to the hostel I thought I would go straight to bed. But it was Saturday so another party. I just wanted to check out how the music was but ended up staying for a while. I had this two french guys in my room who were always in laying in bed when I came in so I had started making fun of them. When I entered the party I heard someone shouting "German girl! We are out of bed!!" Turned out the reason for them spending the whole day in bed was partying hard every night. I met a few new people one of them was Pepijn. We compared funny experiences traveling with names no one could spell or pronounce. The next day my 4 friends went on a mountain bike tour together but as I knew I wouldn't enjoy biking off road mainly downhill to much I decided to skip that and enjoyed a day in the city by myself doing boring stuff like laundry. I had dinner with Andy and Harry before they got on their night bus to La Paz. After 2 nights of party Sunday was a quiet night at the hostel and I went to bed quire early.
Monday I spend browsing around the city a bit more.
I got a pedicure to treat my superdry feet to some intense moisturizing. I'm not the biggest fan of pedicures as I'm quite tingling and I hate the sound and feel of nails being filed. So it was quite intense to have 2 girls working on my feet at the same time. I visited the mini Eifel Tower and bought some more chocolate. I ate the chocolate while sitting in the garden of my hostel writing my blog.
I went back to the taco place for dinner with Dianne as Jeanine had caught a nasty food poisoning. Luckily some medication helped her get rid of it till later that night as we had all bought tickets to catch the nightbus to Cochabamba. I was on another bus than the two girls as I had bought a cheaper ticket. I was a little worried as I had heard horrible stories about busses in Bolivia. Windows that didn't close and cockroaches everywhere. But turned out my bus was completely fine and the seat went further back than in most busses I had been on so far.Read more