Bolivia is a landlocked country that is located right in the middle of South America. The official language is Spanish.
I feel like the eastern half of the country is flat and hot. And the farther west I went, the country got colder and higher and colder. And that’s actually true – the elevation of Santa Cruz de la Sierra is about 400meters (1,300 ft). The elevation of La Paz, on the other hand, is about 3,650meters (11,975 ft). That’s, err, quite a difference.
How I Got There
As usual whenever I travel, I either take a United flight or search for the cheapest flight on kayak.com. I wrote an article about how I stick to flying on United as much as possible to cash out big with my miles.
For this trip, I took a flight from São Paulo to Santa Cruz de la Sierra. I found that flight on kayak.com.
This is going to be tough to only choose from 3, but here we go. Here are my top 3 favorite things to do in Bolivia:
1. Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
I essentially made a game-time decision to fly from Cochabamba to Uyuni in the morning and then fly from Uyuni to La Paz in the evening on the same day. So go ahead, call me Mr. 4th Quarter.
This is the number 1 thing to do in the whole country and I think for good reason.
Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
Salar de Uyuni (Uyuni Salt Flats)
2. Cochabamba – Cristo de la Concordia
Cochabamba is the 3rd largest city in Bolivia but is my personal favorite in the country. There is a Jesus Christ statue (Christo de la Concordia) in this city that is larger than the one in Rio de Janiero.
Cochabamba – Cristo de la Concordia
Cochabamba – Cristo de la Concordia
One more note – there was a cable car that took us up to the top. The surrounding areas of the statue had lookout views of the entire city.
Not bad for a city that I had never heard of prior to my decision to visit Bolivia. I want to give a shoutout to my good friend, Sergio, who is from this beautiful city. I actually met him while I was in Bogota, and we always kept in touch, and he was gracious enough to show me around the city. And he took me out clubbing!
3. Santa Cruz de la Sierra – Guembe
Although I liked Cochabamba a lot more than I liked Santa Cruz, spending two full days in Santa Cruz was worth my time.
Santa Cruz is an interesting city – it’s also Bolivia’s largest. The main streets are structured by a circular patterned which they call “rings” with the main square and cathedrals in the center. The inner-most ring was called “1st ring”. Then there’s a “2nd ring” outside the 1st ring, and so on and so forth. But there are a total of… I want to say 25-ish rings?
Cochabamba – Cristo de la Concordia
Anyways, Guembe is about 10 minutes outside of downtown and was worth the trip. I made the rookie mistake of forgetting to bring my swim suit, so I didn’t enter the way. Brb, crying.
Honorable Mentions
La Paz was great. As I mentioned above, it is SUPER high. Every trip up the stairs took my breath away like I was in Top Gun. But the Witches’ Market had the best area for buying souvenirs and just a cool place in general.
La Paz
La Paz
Cathedral of Santa Cruz
La Paz had Telefericos (cable cars) everywhere. Because when you hear someone say “Take the purple line”, you would think they mean the subway. But then you’re like “oh wait, jk” because you realize that since it’s such a mountainous city, taking cable cars is the most efficient way to get around. So it’s a) tourist-friendly and b) an important means of transportation for locals.
I also really liked visiting the Cathedral of Santa Cruz, located in the center of the city. It had a very nice view of the whole city at the top.
Where I Stayed
I stayed at Airbnb‘s in all 3 cities: Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Cochabamba, and La Paz.
By the way, I wrote a separate article on How I Choose Where I Stay when I Travel.
If I Had More Time, I Would Have…
Visited Sucre, the capital. Ok wait – hold the phone before we move forward. Quick history lesson.
Although La Paz is the executive capital and also the second largest city, Sucre is actually the constitutional capital. Yep – I thought that was quite the head-scratcher too.
I heard Sucre was precious. I would like to visit Sucre one day.
Parque Torotoro is also a must-see according to some other backpackers. And I love nature, so I would love to go back. A day-trip from Cochabamba probably isn’t enough, so I would need to camp at least one night at that National Park.
Closing Remarks
Bolivia has a lot of competition in the tourism industry with it’s surrounding neighbors: Chile, Argentina, Peru, and Brazil.
I mean, that’s a tough pool of big fish…
That’s like asking Javale Mcgee to guard LeBron. You just can’t have high expectations.
But I will say this: Bolivia deserves more recognition, is budget-friendly, and is very underrated in general. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Bolivia.
