Day 36

Tuesday 7^th December 2010

Well, that was supposed to be the end of the Bolivian leg of the trip, but our connecting flight to Buenos Aires was cancelled. So today we are spending an unscheduled day in Santa Cruz.  We hadn’t planned for Santa Cruz so we know nothing about it, JJ sorted us a Hotel and transfers to and from the airport which was really helpful, he’s a good egg JJ.

We arrived about midday and as the plane doors opened my lungs sang the kind of song the birds sing on the first day of spring, so delighted about the abundance of oxygen they were receiving my red blood cells were doing a casual backstroke around my body and it felt so good. Breathing without gasping or a constant burn in the chest is amazing. To hell with you altitude, I shall be spending my days as close to sea level as I can get from now on!!

Santa Cruz is hot, humid and really windy! We stayed at the 5 star Hotel Inn (more of a 3* than a 5, I think they give out stars here if the toilet has a seat - ours was padded hence the 5*!!!).

We dropped the bags and headed for a mooch into town, first of all in the wrong direction but eventually we found the main plaza which included an Irish Bar, winner.

We popped in for a spot of lunch, which was pretty good as it goes, I had a chicken curry much to the envy of Suzanne. She has been doing this a lot so far on the trip, ordering something and then deciding that this isn’t really what she wants and then she sits druelling over my lunch…. Makes you feel quite guilty, you know that look a dog gives you when it really wants a wee but its pouring down outside, that is the look Suz has mastered, I ended up offering to switch meals! One month into married life… God help me!

We tucked a few beers away and had a bit of mess about on t’interweb, Facebook etc etc until the United game started. United were playing Valencia in the Champions League and we needed a draw to win the group, not that anyone else in the city cared. Suz got all caught up with writing the blog and I threw a few more beers down my neck as United eeked out a 1-1 draw.

After which it was time to eat again, we couldn’t really find anywhere that wasn’t absolutely packed, it seems that when work finishes in Santa Cruz everyone goes to the main plaza for tea, a chat or even a nap. We decided to try the food at the hotel, we had a quick shower in case it was posh (don’t wanna go stinking up a smart eatery) and sat down in a deserted restaurant. An hour and fifteen foodless minutes went by as ‘Manuel’ darted from room to room doing….. as far as I could tell, sod all.

When our food arrived it was very poor, 1hr 20 to cook, 2 mins to decide we didn’t want it, you know the foods going be shit when you ask for steak and they don’t ask you how you want it cooked, or in this case, disregard the fact that you asked for it medium. When Suz requested her steak to be cooked medium ‘Manuel’ may as well have put his fingers in his ears and gone la la la la la la la – even though we’ve gone to the trouble of learning the Spanish for medium and know we want all our steaks ‘a punto’.

Disappointed we headed back to our ‘suite’ and got the laptop out. Our flight to Buenos Aires is now at midday tomorrow so we can have a semi lie in and pack in the morning. We watched a film (It’s Complicated starring Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin) and fell asleep in the massive bed.

This IS the end of the Bolivian bit………..we hope!