From the freezing temperatures of the salt flats in south, I headed north to the constitutional capital of Bolivia, Sucre.
I left Uyuni same day as I came. Not because I did not want to see more of it but merely because I was hungering better climate and better accommodation. Uyuni it self was in a state of festivity due to the 150th anniversary of the town. It was somewhat of a shock after the 3 quiet days in the dessert and the altitude still raged inside my body and two days of party was not a situation I could put my self in. Taking the bus, however, was like jumping into the shark pool of Seaworld, Florida, with a meat helmet on. Literally I got on the bus ride from hell as the road from Uyuni to the transit town of Potosi seemed to be constructed by drunk and restless lebricons. 1 hour delayed, 7 hours driving and every 30min the driver would stop and bang the brakes into place with a hist fist…. or a hammer. Mind you this was an overnight bus so sleeping should be included. At one time, I had just fallen asleep, I found my self launched 1.5m into the air, banging my head on the ceiling and catapulted my sorry ass down into the seat. The driver had apparently missed a huge bump in the dark but it really did not seem to bother him. Not until all the passengers started shouting at him to stop and check if something had fallen off, did it occur to me that my bag was on the roof. The driver went out, searched and found nothing.
We arrived a few hours later in Potosi where we had to change buses, my bag being there and all we had a quick change and thought that we would continue immediately. Apparently being very few people in the bus was not to the company´s satisfaction and the next hour we spend circling the city while the driver all the time would shout “Sucre” out the window.
Finally getting moving we had 4 hours of driving before arriving in Sucre. This was quite a change and i had never expected Bolivia to be like this; how good it was to be surprised. Sucre resembles mostly an Italian city and being situated in the mountains gave for very good view points, especially at sunsets. I spend three days there recovering from the dessert. This included a lot of good food, relaxing and a trip to a nearby village which produced all kinds of textiles. Two English girls, Rachel and Laura, whom I took the bus with from Uyuni, more or less bought half the village.
