La Paz (Bolivia)

La Paz is dizzying in every aspect. Often wrongly described as the world's highest national capital (Sucre is the constitutional capital of Bolivia), it is a gigantic city in the form of a bowl, surrounded by some of the Andes' highest peaks.

We first had a hostel in the historic (and touristic) center of the city. That area is quite a culture shock for us, spoiled Europeans. There are (very) steep, narrow streets with more cars than they can manage, a lot of poverty and pollution and litterally thousands of people lilving, working and eating on the streets. We were really hungry that first evening, so we walked into a random restaurant, where we met the Bolivian way of doing business. After ordering the food, the only waitress in that place left the restaurant for half an hour and finally came back with our dishes. All that time, there was nobody to serve people or to take orders. And where did our food come from? Who can tell...

La Paz is really big, so you have to do a lot of walking if you want to see the interesting places and miradors. If you know there's 1km difference in altitude between the highest part and the lower suburbs, it's no surprise that there´s a lot of climbing involved. Although we're pretty used to the height right now, we still feel like we're dying several times a day.

We heard nice stories about the world's highest curry house serving the world's hottest vindaloo. If you can finish the dish, you get a free t-shirt. Of course, Thomas had to try it. I'm not sure weather or not it is the world's hottest vindaloo, but damn... for sure it's the hottest thing I ever ate, beating all the spicy stuff I had in Thailand. After struggling with every bite, crying many tears, using all paper tissues that were available, I finished it. I didn't enjoy it at all, but hey... I'll do everything for a free 1$ t-shirt.