Safely in Bolivia

Hey, gang, I'm safely here in Bolivia. My flights were uneventful, and I even had an aisle seat next to an empty middle seat for the longest leg. We arrived here at 5 a.m., and I'm going to try to stay awake all day so I can sleep through the night. We have a really packed schedule for the rest of the trip, so I'm going to try to relax and see a little of the city today. I'm here in the hotel, which is very nice, catching up on email, etc. and then will head out this afternoon. At 2 p.m. Jen (the World Vision person who is also traveling on this project) and I will meet in the lobby and catch a cab to a famous church called San Francisco; we'll walk around there a while and catch a very eary dinner and then head back here and crash. I'll have my camera and will take pics of the church (if allowed) and some of the sites.

The drive from the airport to the hotel was beautiful. It was about a 40-minute drive. The airport is at really high altitude, and the road to the hotel winds around a mountain down past a valley filed with greenery and red/pink buildings made of brick, with even taller mountains with snow in the background. When we started the drive, we were close to cloud level, and it was beautiful to see that valley of greenery and red/pink buildings as we drove down through wispy clouds. Along the road we saw people walking, and it seemed that the generational differences really affected what people wear. Young women were in jeans and coats. Older women were in long loose skirts, colorful shawls, and those hats that kind of look like bowler hats that you've probably seen in pics of traditional Bolivian garb. Whereas in Mozambique you see a lot of women walking with babies tied to their backs with colorful fabric and loads of things they are carrying balanced on their heads, here you see women strapping loads of things to their backs with colorful fabric and babies clasped to the chest. I'll try to get some nice pics from the taxi this afternoon.

Okay, signing off now. More from me later!