In the center of La Paz

 La Paz is located on the sides of a very steep and rather narrow valley at the end of the high flat Altiplano of El Alto. At the deepest part there is a city highway running from El Alto to the south-east. The Plaza Mayor with the San Francisco church (started in 1548 as a convent) is located on the right side (when going down) of this main road.

Next to the Plaza Mayor is the market hall. A large concrete building with a lot of food stalls. No it is not a parking garage. From this market hall a colorful footbridge crosses the busy road into the city center on the other side.

Looking from the bridge to (more or less) the west......

...... and the other way to El Alto.

 

The road leading up to the Plaza Murillo is a walking area.

At the corner of the Plaza Murillo is the National Art Museum. A beautiful old building outside and inside.

The Metropolitan Cathedral built in 1835.

The presidential palace, the Palacio Quemado, is also situated on the Plaza Murillo

From the bridge at the market you have to climb some steep streets to go to Jaén street. As you have to stop a few times to get some air, look back and surprise yourself. The view to El Alto is amazing.

Jaén street is one of the few areas that have been restored. Here you also find many museums. 

On the corner of this arcade is a nice restaurant. Time to sit down and take a rest.

An ocean of houses......

La Paz  ... the highest (administrative) capital in the world.
Altitude 3650 meters.

The plane landed at the airport at El Alto; flat as a polder. Driving to the hotel in downtown La Paz we suddenly drove into a huge chasm. La Paz is built on the sides of this chasm all the way down to where the chasm becomes a valley.

Almost all the houses are built like cubes. Concrete pillars and walls of bricks in between. 

A wall of houses going up. Where the wall ends, the city of El Alto starts.  

A good looking neighbourhood in La Paz. 

La Paz, clinging to the "wall".

The city centre of La Paz. Left of the high rise building (one third of the left in the middle) is the presidential palace. 

In the background the mountain Illimani, the guardian of the city.
Illimani is 6438 meters high.

 

La Paz is a large city with almost a million inhabitants.

You can click here to see this panorama in a larger format.

Sucre to La Paz by air

Sucre airport. We are leaving for la Paz.

Flying over the Andes.

A large cement factory. Part of the mountains is disappearing.

Snow and ice. 

Snow on the fields.

We are nearing La Paz. The landscape gets more and more flat.

El Alto, with more than 1,5 million inhabitants lies above La Paz, on the Altiplano. The Altiplano is here as flat as the polders in Holland.

Farms on the edge of the town.

Small fields along winding rivers.

Here you can see the claimed plots. Some of them still empty.

A huge city lies down there.

It is high (over 4000 meters) and cold. Houses are not very well isolated.  

In some places the uniformity of squares is broken by other forms. 

Almost there.....

Churches everywhere, but this one makes me think of a Russian cathedral....
To get to La Paz we have to go down into a steep slope almost into a crack in the Altiplano.

Colonnade with a view....

On top of an hill, overlooking the city, lies the convent of Recoleta (Franciscan - 1601). The convent is among other things famous for its chapel with wood carvings. It was not allowed to take pictures inside the convent (except for the chapel).

 

The convent is interesting, but I really liked the square in front and the magnificent view from the colonnade.

At the feet of the colonnade was a small restaurant..... with a terrace.... with that view....

Sucre

We walk in Sucre, low historical buildings, busy traffic and fantastic bundles of electrical wires (as everywhere else in Latin America).

The capital Sucre is the 5th largest city of Bolivia. 

Apart from  the "Casa de la Libertad" and the "Supreme Court" there are many churches, and other buildings that are interesting. Later we will visit the Recoleta convent.

A grand Theater.

The impressive Government Palace of the department of  Chuquisaca build in 1896.

Just leave it to the women to keep the streets clean......