Today I had a wander round in the massive city that is called La Paz! And it is HUGE! Wherever I look I just see the city sprawling out in front of me and up into the surrounding mountains!

I missed breakfast in my hostel this morning so I had to find somewhere outside to eat. Being lazy I Google Mapped the closest Starbucks. Turns out there are none in Bolivia, but I did get a hit on Google Maps and that was a place called Alexander´s Coffee. Described as the Bolivian Starbucks. Why not I thought? So off I went! Starbucks it was not – but it did have decent coffee and some breakfast-like food. From there I wandered a bit further and came across a street that was blocked off by fences. And guarded by multiple armed soldiers. Turns out it was heavily guarded because these were the streets that surround the Bolivian Palace of Government.

This building is situated on Plaza Murillo. A square with a big statue in the middle and smaller statues around the edges.

And, as it seems with all squares on this continent, there were hoards of pigeons! A small boy was standing in the middle of them, feeding them and didn´t seem at all bothered by the fact that they were landing on his arms, shoulders and even head!

Other sights in La Paz include the Witches Market and Jaen Street. I was expecting the Witches Market to be, well full of witches. Or at least stall selling all kinds of potions and maybe the occasional voodoo doll. For as far as I could tell, it just sold souvenirs. Oh and the occasional alpaca foetus(!). Jaen Street was a pretty, narrow, old street with colourful houses. There are a number of museums here, providing a history of La Paz or Bolivia.

Last job of the day was to visit the bus terminal and arrange a ticket out of this city! Easy-peasy you may say... but the bus terminal was overwhelming! On entering, there were people yelling various city names, trying to get me to book a ticket at their stand. I declined. My tactic was first do a round of all the stalls and then pick the bus I liked the look of best! They all had photos of the buses themselves and some even had photos of the insides and the different seat options. Sucre will be my next stop and it is a 12 hour overnight journey from La Paz. So I was looking for a bus that had full-flat seats. It would be more expensive, but my back would be grateful! For 180 Bolivianos (€23) I managed to find something called a "suite executive" seat on a bus leaving La Paz tomorrow night. It´s even a single seat, so I won´t have any strangers snoring away next to me...