On my way to Tarija, Bolivia

The flight from Düsseldorf to London and from London to Miami went very well, as only later I found out that 2 days later all air traffic in northern Europe was grounded due to the volcanic activity in Island. During my 10 hour layover in Miami, I went killed some time with heading to a near by shopping mall, having some lunch, watching a movie and buying a new pair of Maui Jim sunglasses. So far so good.
However, on the flight from Miami to La Paz, we experienced technical problems above Cuba, and had to return to Miami. We were told there was a minor technical problem, but upon landing in Miami, there were fire trucks and ambulances waiting for us on the runway. Guess the technical problem was not that minor, and it looked we got away lucky. At Miami International Airport, we had to wait all night (9 hours!), only to leave again at 8 am in the morning.
Upon arriving at El Alto, the airport at La Paz, Bolivia (also the highest big airport in the world, at 4100 meters above sea level) the custom clearance went quick. Gasping for air (high altitude), I made my way to the luggage belt. Only to find out that American Airlines had lost one of my luggages. Due to the delayed flight, I also missed my connecting flights to Cochabamba and Tarija: so I called it a day. Having traveled and hardly slept for 40 hours, I told the American Airliines representative to book me a hotel for the night. They wanted to book me on a late afternoon flight to Tarija, but without my missing luggage, I wasn’t going anywhere. So I stayed the night in La Paz, and enjoyed the amazing panorama of the city of La Paz, as the taxi drove down from El Alto (4100 m) to La Paz city (3600 m).
After checking in in hotel Europe, I had dinner with the representative of Broederlijk Delen (the belgian NGO I work for). Over night, the slight altitude headache went away, with some help of a few cups of coca leaf tea.
The next morning, my lost bag arrived with the morning flight from Miami and I caught my 2 inland flights, La Paz – Cochabamba, Cochabamba – Tarija. The scenery is breath taking, Andean snow covered peaks (upto 6800 m) just below the plane’s windows. Tarija was finally almost in sight. My Latin adventure has started and as the representative of my NGO told me, during dinner, I right away I got a taste of what is coming me for the next 2 years……