Visiting the Sites

On Saturday morning we woke up and I was glad that we all showered the afternoon before. The water is warm enough, but the air chills you as soon as the water is gone. Brrr....

It was nice to have a leisurely breakfast with Nelson and Charo. The kids played a bit and then we decided that we were going to head to the plaza. We wanted to see downtown and maybe do some shopping. We took a micro to the centre and enjoyed riding in a very colourful and tall bus. The buses are old Dodge school buses, but painted with psychedelic colours. I couldn't figure out how Cochabamba lucked out with all the tall buses. Everyone there is so short and in Santa Cruz, I always have to duck to stand in the micro!

We had a nice time in the plaza. It's called 14 de Septiembre, because that's Cochabamba Day, just like 24 de Septiembre is the name of our main plaza, the day of our city's anniversary. An interesting way to commemorate the holiday. We fed the pigeons (shudder, those things are gross...it's fun for the kids, it's fun for the kids) and walked around. The downtown has a very colonial feel to it, very different from our downtown. We located the artesenia market and did a bit of shopping. Afterwards, we headed to a restaurant with a great play park and huge burgers for lunch. We had been eating some great typical Cochabamba food and were looking for something different.

The next day, we went to El Cristo since Sunday is the safest day to go up on the hill. We took a taxi from our host home to the top of the hill, but the bottom of the stairs. They aren't kidding it's hard to hike up with thin air! And of course we had to carry Asha because "her legs weren't working". That's her latest thing now or "Me duelen". !!

Once we got up, it was quite the sight to see. We took lots of pictures and visited with some of the other visitors. Some were from Florida, and another was a Bolivian lady in her traditional skirt from Chapare. Carl and I took turns climbing the 10 flights of stairs up in the inside of El Cristo with Joel and Kezia. At each level, you could look out out a porthole to the grounds and city below. Joel was disappointed that we couldn't climb all the way to the head, but Kezia figured that with so many people crowded up there, it would probably just topple off.

We spent the morning there, then made our way back to the centre for lunch. In the afternoon, we headed home to have a nap. The evening was spent visiting and doing a bit of homework. Thankfully, we had met with the directors of our school, Janine and Joaquin, and had made some arrangements for child care and classes the next day. Here's hoping that makes the difference as we start the week of classes....