The one where Lynne turned 35

Yes the big birthday that was one of the catalysts for the trip arrived while I was in Puno. Woke to open Katie´s present which she´d given me before leaving. Thanks!
We headed by bus to the Bolivian border. Oh my god it was the craziest border crossing Ive ever seen. It took 3 hours. It was market day, so there were thousands of people selling stuff and walking around. Our bus was driving through crowds of people.
Thankfully our border crossing was only 3 hours .. the locals were in for a much longer wait. Being tourists meant we were fast tracked.
It was then another couple of hours drive to La Paz. The scenery was surreal. It was like Dubbo meets the Canadian Rockies. We were driving through barren land, then in the background were huge snowy mountains.
La Paz rocks. Crazy, chaotic, no road rules, people everywhere. Very different to Peru. I love it.
Being my birthday, we took guidance from the Lonely Planet and headed to a bar restaurant called RamJam and had huge meals for $7. Its so cheap here.
Paul, Rena and I stayed and drank Pisco Sours, then moved to a bar called Mongos. It didnt get going till about 1am, but when it did there was lots of dancing, chatting to drunk tourists (well Rena did most of the talking, and convinced one guy to a dance off. She does Running Man very well).
Then that place closed and we headed to one of those cool underground places where you go in via an unmarked door. Was lots of fun. When we wanted to leave the bouncer wouldnt let us out cause the cops were outside!!! But we managed to make it home (thanks to a 100m cab ride cause we had no idea where we were in relation to our hotel. Turned out to be very close).
Yesterday we slept, Paul and I had pizza for lunch and headed up to the top of the city for breathtaking views. La Paz is in a valley.
We had our final group dinner then it was time to say goodbye. Agghhhh I hate goodbyes. Cant believe Paul and Rena have gone! I just wanted to smuggle them into my backpack and make them come on the rest of the trip with me. We became such good friends and Ill miss them heaps. Who will I have bitchy banter with now Pauls not here????