I took a bus from Cusco, Peru to Copacabana, Bolivia with a brief stop in Puno for breakfast and an opportunity to buy some cheap gloves before the sun rise...
My first stop in Bolivia was at the border where I paid a reciprocity fee visa. This is a visa fee (ooh I got a sticker in my passport) required of US citizens because the US raised visa fees on South Americans. Bolivia is the first country I've been to that has enforced it but many of the South American countries have a fee on the books which can be optional for border guards.
I was prepared for the visa requirements, over prepared really, because they only asked for half of my documentation... And of course the money. 7 crispy twenties is what they asked for, but the guard rejected 4 of my 10 notes because they had small tears in them. I ended up giving him a roughly equivalent amount of bolivianos to satisfy the requirement and was the first person back on the bus (Americans were a second line).
While we were at the border there was also a bit of a hassle for Israeli citizens. The Bolivian government attempts to be an ultra progressive supporter of all underdogs in the world(perhaps more on this later). So similar to the reciprocity fee being reactionary to US policy, theBolivian government recently put extra restrictions on Israeli citizens due to the recent war in Gaza. I heard an older Israeli man describe the two lines as something he remembered his parents going through about 70 years ago... (not technically accurate as Jewish citizens of other countries were not being detained). Politics are not always clean. Israelis typically are one of the biggest groups of travelers in Bolivia (and much of South America), so this policy seems extra hurtful to them.
Copa is basically a tiny little tourist town that acts as the first Bolivian city across the border as well as an access port to the islands of Lake Titicaca. The most famous island is probably Isla del Sol which has religious pilgrimage significance for people who follow Andean religions, and used to be visited regularly by people within the Incan empire.
The villages and ruins of Isla del Sol look a lot like smaller versions of the Sacred Valley sites. Unfortunately I got sick on the day I was going to spend on the island so I only ended up spending an hour in one of the towns nearest to Copa.
Copa also contains a few old Inca sites, but they aren't much to see anymore.
The town itself contains a beach with lots of little paddle boats that look like swans, geese and ducks- as well as some tented restaurants where you can get local food for cheap (chicharron de trucha, papas fritas,arroz y coca cola por 25 bolivianos- pieces of fried trout with fries, rice and a coke for about 4 bucks).
Copa also has a Christian pilgrimage site, in the massive beautiful church.
And tons of tourist restaurants with hippie looking guys trying to sell you drugs outside of them.
Other than that it's some hills to walk up... One of which used to be an Incan astronomical observatory.
Good times, but like most people it was more than ready to leave the tourist spot as soon as possible.
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