Road to La Paz, the City of Peace(?), and on to the border!

Once back in Copacabana we realized that the crazy party that had been underway was now gone and the town was back to its quiet, usual self. We booked bus tickets to La Paz and shortly boarded on our crickety old bus with a million other people.
The road was rough but had beautiful views of the lake. After a while we reached a port with a ferry to take us and the bus across to the other side separately. Since there were no ATMs in Copacabana we were running really low on cash and had not anticipated this ferry or its fee. Fortunately we had just enough with about $0.10 to spare, if that. Close one.
We re-boarded the bus and drove on for another hour or two when, all of the sudden, the bus driver pulled over and the bus shut down. He pulled up the board covering the engine and began to work on it. Everyone looked around nervously and, after a bit, he told us all to get off the bus. We would have to wait for alternate transit to take us the rest of the way to La Paz. We sat on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere for quite some time before this alternate transit arrived-- a minivan to fit at most half of us. We piled in and made our way to La Paz.
Once in La Paz, we were surprisingly dropped off somewhere quite far from where we were supposed to be dropped off and we were supposed to take a cab the rest of the way. hmmm... but we had no cash on us. hmmm... some police officers found us, told us to put our backpacks on in the front or we´d get robbed and directed us to the nearest ATMs, which were several blocks away. It was night.
La Paz means the city of peace... well, I think they need to rename it the city of anarchy. It´s the most chaotic city I´ve ever seen (and I´ve seen many). It was truly overwhelming. After we finally located our ATM it was really difficult to find and catch a cab, but we finally did and made our way to a hostel with super saggy beds and shared bathrooms. This is where I got really sick. My stomach just couldn´t handle the ultra unhygienic food handling and greesy food and finally revolted against me in the cruellest of ways. After I wrote that first bit on the last entry I was making my way to the bathroom to throw up again, but ended up passing out on the way instead.
Unbelievably, the next morning I made it to the bus terminal and got the heck out of dodge. After driving for a bit, we ran into one of the infamous Bolivian road blockades. As soon as I´m able I´ll post a picture of it. We were really worried that we would have to wait there for the rest of the day, but after an hour or two many of the people in the long line of buses got out and physically romoved the rocks from the road so that we could pass. The protesters were not too happy about it, but we passed nonetheless. Second major busride incident in Bolivia.
Fortunately, we just made it to our train on time. The trains to the southern Argentinean border only leave a few times a week, so we were really happy to have made it.
I was so excited to finally be on a train instead of a bus, but after this 16 hour train ride I was aching to be back on a bus. It was so incredibly dirty... I mean, dirt coming in through every vent and being sucked up into my nose and down into my lungs with every breath. By the time we arrived at the border in the morning my nostrils were jam packed with dirt and every time I blew my nose the tissue was covered with snotty dirt. Gross, huh?