Rocky Mountain high

Los Glazers are fatigued, hungry and back in La Paz after three days at the world´s "highest navigable lake," Titicaca.
The sun is bright up there and roasted both the fair-skinned and the browner members of this pseudo-Bolivian family as we hiked around what locals believe to be the birthplace of civilization.
We spent Thursday with a new friend from Madrid hiking the length of La Isla Del Sol, about a three-hour ferry ride from our base in the travelers´ hub of Copacabana. At the northern tip is a set of pre-Inca ruins -- a labyrinth used most likely for ceremonial purposes (isn´t that the archeologist´s cop out?). There also was a hole purported to be the mouth of a tunnel, dug by the Incas, that led to Cuzco hundreds of miles away and other important hubs.
We learned all this from a nice Dutch grad student who is there doing his dissertation. He also shared some coca leaves with us as we hiked the six-mile rolling Inca trail to the southern part of the island. Doesn´t sound like much distance, but at close to 15,000 feet each step is a chore. The wad of pungent leaves in our mouth -- yes, Sonya partook as well -- gave at least a placebic boost for the second half of the trip. Of course we have lots of photos, including one of Sonya spitting out her chaw, but won´t be able to post them until we return to Santa Cruz next week.
We took another hike yesterday from Copacabana but got a bit lost. While we didn´t see any of the ruins or fish hatcheries that the cabronazo Lonely Planet promised us, we did catch some good scenery and exposure to Andean farm life.
We also made the acquaintance of a black sheep dog who we named Sebastian. The poor guy followed us, panting, for three hours from a village in the middle of nowhere back almost to Copacabana. When the city was finally visible, Sebastian started to whine and turned around. I guess he realized he had followed the wrong couple.

El Alto workshop

Strange as it may sound, a university in a city known for its radical anti-Americanism and mass protests and riots that drove two presidents from power in two years invited me, El Gringo Grande, to speak about how to improve local journalism. What makes it even more of a shock is that the U.S. Embassy was a co-host of the event.
The 60-so attendees couldn't live in the same country as my wealthy white students at La UPSA. Most speak Ayamara at home, not Spanish. Most have to walk several city blocks to get clean water. Most support the leftist Cocalero, Castro-Chavez friend Evo Morales for president.
But they were a polite and engaged audience. I think I had them when I bashed Bush's slow response to Hurricane Katrina. And when I opened with the line, "So I hear they don't like Gringos much up here."
The theme of my talk was that it's normal to have opinions, but that as a reporter you have to leave them at home. A simple concept, but many of the participants of the seminar run some of the 300 neighborhood radio stations that rally the masses to close off the highways and shut down La Paz when they want to "negotiate" with the government.
I got asked some interesting questions -- How would I cover Cuban immigration to the states? Can I print whatever I want in the U.S.? Have I ever been threatened?
Afterwards, I visited the newsroom of El Alto`s only newspaper, the three-year-old El Alteño. It has a staff of five reporters and a circulation of some 2,500, the director said.
Surprising since El Alto is a city of about 1 million and growing. Made up of Quechua and Ayamara migrants from other parts of the country, the city sits in the hills about 1,000 feet above the capital city, La Paz, which is at 14,000. To get there, the white Chevy Suburban provided by the embassy (not too obvious) climbed winding roads as steep as any in San Francisco. There is an amazing view of La Paz from up there, a splash of red roofs that climb up onto the hillside. The white-capped Mt. Illumani is the backdrop.