Company: El Dorado
Type: Economy
Price: 120 BOB
Duration: 12.5 hrs

Description: Boarding our first long hall bus journey in Bolivia was definitely a little more stressful than in other South American countries. There was a very strange system of taking your bags up a flight of stairs and down a long corridor to be tagged, before lowering them down by a rope in front of the bus. It was a pretty confusing, and with all the running around and getting tickets and tags we only managed to get on the bus with 5 minutes to spare! Our seats had randomly changed from 27-28 (downstairs) to 1-2, the front seats upstairs, and we weren't sure why, but went along with it anyway.

Additionally we were told that Bolivian buses don't offer any food or water, so we made sure we ate and stocked up with plenty before we got on. After the rather stressful boarding, all seemed to go smoothly and we even managed a few hours sleep (after the loud Spanish-dubbed John Claud van dam film had finished). At cx we arrived at La Paz, the second capital of Bolivia situated at 4500m above sea level. La Paz is a convenient (and cheap) launchpad from which to visit the Amazon basin and so it was our next port of call.