La Paz and Setting the Record Straight

So I landed in La Paz. 3600 meters -over 4000 meters depending on which district of this town in a steep valley one happens to be in. I've happily hit rock bottom at around 3600 m and feeling the benifits. I still huff and puff like a centinarian with asthma when I climb the 5 floors to my hostel room, but at least there's no pain.

Oh and just to set the record straight, this city's real name is not La Paz. You know we have cities with really long names in Finland (e.g. Salo, Pori or Ii) and so we naturally like to abbreviate them. Therefore Helsinki is called Hesa and La Paz is really La Ciudad de Nuestra Senora de la Paz - the City of Our Lady of Peace - and has been that since it was founded in 1548.

The reason for its founding was that it is a central point in trade routes and, more importantly, it sat smack bang on a huge gold vein. The Spaniards commenced to suck this vein dry with a fevour, which would have left Count Dracula envious and had nothing manana about it whatsoever.

So here I am some half a millenium later and though the silver has run dry, La Paz blossoms. Oh, and guess what? There's a carnival in progress! I have to say that the participants, notably the bands, seem much more professional than the ones in Puno. But somehow the shows are also less endearing then Puno's little old ladies from local villages having the time of their lives.

There are several fine and usually slightly delapidated buildings left from the collonial era, but more impressively from here in the valley bottom the night sky twinkles with limitless new constellations and stars - the lights from houses on the steep sides of the valley. And hovering good naturedly over all this is La Paz's guardian mountain, the three peaked Illimani, a not-so-humble 6402 meters high. No, I am NOT going mountain climbing.