Backpacking Bolivia: Part Three (Sucre)

Sunday, July 8th

After returning from our Salar de Uyuni trip and having one last dinner with most of our group members, we went to check in to our 10PM overnight bus. We went to check in and the woman informed us that we needed a printed ticket, even though we bought our tickets online using Ticketsbolivia.com and had the confirmation in PDF with a scanable QR code on Michael’s iPhone, ah Bolivia how I love ya.

So we walked around the small town of Uyuni with our packs on our backs for a solid 30 minutes trying to find any Cyber Cafes that would print our tickets for us. But mind you, it was Sunday evening, around 8PM and everything was closed.

We went back to the lady with no printed tickets and explained, very politely, that everything was closed. A nice gentleman, we think he may have worked for the bus company, took a photo of the ticket on Michael’s phone and said everything was fine, so we just went with it. 

So we got our tickets, loaded our packs, and got on the bus. We left around 10:15PM and arrived in Sucre around 5AM. 

Monday, July 9th

After arriving in Sucre, we took a cab from the bus terminal for 10 Bolivianos (a little over $1) to our hostel. We are staying in Hostal CasArte Takutamba, a funky little hostel about a 10 minute walk from the city center.

We hung out in their designated “you arrived early but you can’t get into your room yet,” section and I caught up on blogging while Michael took a quick nap.

Our hostel! It's so quirky and cute!

Inside view of the hostel.

Around 8ish, we decided to head out in search of breakfast.

Sucre is such a beautiful town! Many of the buildings are built in old Colonial style and are white-washed/painted.

We walked the streets until we found a restaurant called El Patio, which was recommended to Michael by a friend.

We each had one chicken Saltena and one beef Saltena and they were phenomenal! The best we’ve had thus far! I also had some very strong coffee to go along with my Saltenas.

After our breakfast, we continued walking around the city center (where literally almost everything is located) and we decided to pay 10 Bolivianos each (a little over $1) to visit a Human Anatomy Museum. This was super strange but really cool and we saw some intriguing and disturbing things but definitely worth the $1!

We then sat in the main square for awhile watching children and dogs chase the pigeons around before heading back to our hostel to check in!

We had wonderful hot showers and then just chilled for awhile before grabbing dinner at a local joint where we ate traditional Bolivian food.

Tuesday, July 10th

On Tuesday, we decided to do a walking tour through a local company called Condor Trekkers. This is a nonprofit company that runs many different tours with proceeds going back to the Bolivian community. Plus, we are all for walking tours, especially when it’s our first or second day in a new city. They offer great insights into the history and culture of the city you’re visiting and usually have really knowledgeable guides to answer any questions you may have. We did a three hour city tour with Briaun from Condor Trekkers and he was awesome! He led us all around the city (luckily Sucre is pretty easy to walk!) and was super knowledgeable about his city. We saw many great things and even ate chocolate, small sandwiches, and had some delicious Chicha (fermented corn beer.)

Market snack.

Day drinking, Bolivian style.

After our tour we opted to walk back down to town from La Recoleta on our own. We stopped back in the chocolate shop Briaun took us to to buy chocolate and maybe some ice cream. We then headed on our way to a cafe to watch the France v. Belgium game!

We also managed to fit a tour of the Freedom House, where some of the important Bolivian historical documents reside, and a tour of the Cathedral in Sucre (apparently we were touring maniacs this day!)

For dinner we went to a popular bar/cafe in the middle of town for some Happy Hour drinks and good food!

Wednesday, July 11th

We slept in today folks! We didn’t get up and going until around 11ish, after eating breakfast in our hostel.

Side note: We have to consistently remind ourselves that we are on vacation and sometimes that means sleeping in and relaxing until 11AM. Yes, we want to fit in every possible thing we can see and do, but we also need to sleep! So we’re working on not having travel FOMO.

After pulling ourselves out of bed, we took a taxi out to Parque Cretacico (think Jurassic Park) to see the 65 million year old dinosaur tracks in a big slab of rock.

Apparently the site of this park is an active construction site where they were doing their jobs and stumbled upon a shite ton of dinosaur tracks (pretty cool, huh?)

If you go between 12PM and 1PM, you can catch the guided tour where you walk down, down, down to the bottom so you can get an up close view of the tracks in Cal Orck’o (doesn’t this name sound like an evil villian in an Avengers movie OR a Dothraki?)

This is Cal Orck'o (Avengers Villain, Dothraki, or old ass slab of rock.

These prints are massive. 

Anyways, we walked down and got some great photos but then we had to walk up. YUCK. It is worth it and we did make it but we definitely had to stop and catch our breath a few times.

We toured the rest of the musuem, learning about the different dinosaurs that roamed the area and then took a local bus back to the city center, just in time to see the England v. Croatia game. We were really rooting for you England!!!

We walked around the city more, sat in our favorite square watching the break dancers and local musicians and then Michael had a pizza burger pizza. Yep, you read that right.

Pizza burger pizza. He said it was delicious. 

Thursday, July 12th

We woke up earlier today, had a delicious breakfast, and then headed for our last church tour. On the way, we stumbled upon a parade of Bolivian military branches being held in the city center. We watched as the bands played and they marched. It’s always cool to catch these things when you’re traveling.

After feeling really patriotic, we went to the San Francisco church where we took a guided tour of the area, including the bell tower and the crypt! The crypt has only been open to the public for about two years and it’s really neat to walk down into.

We went back to our favorite Saleñteria (El Patio) for chicken Saleñtas before hopping in a taxi to the airport.

We flew from Sucre to La Paz and then La Paz to Bogota. Our flight doesn’t leave for Bogota until 3ishAM on Friday, so we’re just chilling in the La Paz airport planning out what we’ll be doing in Colombia for the next two weeks.

The city of Sucre was absolutely stunning. It was very different from La Paz (which was also wonderful) but it's smaller, more quaint, and the architecture if magnificient. We really loved Sucre. 

Colombia, we’re coming for you and we couldn’t be more excited!

With love,

Emily