A Long and Sad Two Days

Well, a lot can happen in a week--or not happen. After sliding down into La Paz we had high hopes of a nice, cheap stint in Bolivia. After a day of cruising around the city we decided to take a quick flight up to the northern part of the country and visit an ecolodge just outside of Madidi National Park. After much deliberation regarding the associated costs, i.e. flight, tours and lodging, we decided that we absolutely had to go. We made all the arrangements and were happy about the decision...spiders the size of frisbees, snakes large enough to swallow us whole--it was a must. (Now, go to Google and search Madidi to see photos of how amazing it looks there, because we never made it.)

The next morning found us at the airport at 5:45 am so that we could make the flight at 6:50. We were advised to expect delays because of the grass airstrip in Rurrenabaque where we would land, and the occasional overbooking of passengers. So, when we tried to check our bags we were not entirely surprised to hear that the flight was delayed. From here it´s all downhill...we started to hear people murmering about yet another delay, talking under their breath about the same runaround from the airline the day before, etc. We asked a couple from New York if they knew what was going on and they filled us in on a secret--90% of the people there waiting to get on the plane, the plane that we were supposed to board at 6:50 that would take us to the most incredible rainforest in the world, those people had all tried to get on the same flight to Rurrenabaque the day before. Not only was our flight delayed, there was an entire flight in front of us that still hadn´t left from the previous day. Not good. The plane only holds 20 people or so, and our understanding was that the entire fleet was only made up of a few of them.

An hour of waiting turned into two, then three, then four. ¨Check back in an hour,¨ the clerk would tell us again and again as the time on the departure board kept getting pushed back. At 3:30 pm the flight ahead of us had still not left and no one really knew what was going on. At 4:30 they said there would be no flights that day and to come back in the morning. Smoke they told us finally--the pilot would not be able to land because he would not be able to see the runway. Apparently there are intentional ground fires in the Amazon every September, but no one had ever mentioned that small detail. Funny that they would even sell the plane tickets if they knew no one would be going anywhere.For those of you who have had long delays I don´t need to describe the bizarre and exhausting sensation that comes with being in an airport for 11 hours.

The next morning we showed up again, hopeful, but still uncertain. Less people this time but the same story. After the same guy from Amazonias kept telling us to coma back in an hour for updates people were beyond loosing their patience, and after a description from the actual pilot of the situation in ´Rurri´, we knew we weren´t going anywhere. In fact, he made it sound like no one would be going up there all week. The second option was a 17-20 hour bus ride to the park, but it would have added another three or four days of travel time, and we decided not to sacrifice the days (not an easy decision) since we have a long ways to go in the next month and a half. Disheartened, we asked to cancel our flight and made our way back down to La Paz--back to the traffic, honking, yelling, steep streets, odd smells, llama fetuses for sale....

The runaround we got trying to get our money back from the airline was the icing on the cake, and another story of its own that is too long for the likes of this already long post (but it did involve several taxi rides to the offices in the city, a bout of diarreah and a fierce rainstorm while we were on the streets). Why, oh why, do we have such a hard time getting out of the capital cities of South American countries? I think we will skip Santiago (Chile) all together.

All the way to S. America and no rain forest...it just doesn´t seem right. Argentina will be our last chance, but we are already southbound, so the chances of seeing frightening jungle creatures aren´t that great anymore. Sigh.......La Paz was neat (for a city), but not as neat as a monkey or a two-toed sloth.