Life at 12,000ft

As the month of March comes to a close and we are hearing endless stories of beautiful, spring weather back home in the states, we are actually getting our dose of 'winter' here in La Paz.  Or, as wintery as this year will be for us.  Since we're in southern hemisphere, it's actually fall going on winter but typical La Paz weather means highs in the 50s, lows in the 30s, pretty much all year round.  The rest of our travels have been/will be spent in more tropical climates so literally, these four weeks are our winter.  After my last overconfident and naïve blog post concerning the weather here, we have since experienced some rather cold and rainy days and nights.  We bought colorful Bolivian slippers to keep our feet warm in the evenings, dress in layers, try to keep a hat on Eli's head when we go outside (although the latest game is taking off the hat as soon as it's put on) and purchased an electric space heater for Eli’s room.  Warm baby = sleeping baby = sleeping parents. 

The latest and greatest news from our end is Jason’s research.  It short, the archives here are chock-full of pertinent, interesting and useful documents.  Hooray!!  We are heartily rejoicing.  Afternoon siesta continues from 12:30 to 3, so either Jason comes home for lunch or Eli or I take public transport downtown to meet him.  

The rest of my and Eli’s days are filled with play time on the rug, stroller and ergo outings, naps (aka Mom’s time to get things done around the apt), and navigating the slippery wooden floor of our apartment as Eli maneuvers and moves more and more on his own.

 He and I have been taking daily walks in the stroller during the afternoon hours and while I’d like to think my lungs are getting in shape, I strayed from our regular route yesterday and thus we found ourselves at the bottom of a very steep hill.  Home was at the top, so I hoofed the stroller upwards.  Instead of walking at a 90 degree angle, my body was literally at a 45 degree angle while pushing the stroller.  I’m sure it provided some comic relief for any Bolivians watching from their open apartment windows, but I was seriously gasping for air by the time we reached the top.

Cooking here has also been a bit of an exploration. I had a vague notion of needing to make adjustments due to the high altitude, but on our first Saturday morning I made pancakes and was astounded at how much they puffed up; my pancakes have NEVER been so fluffy.  After googling “baking and cooking at 12,000ft”, I was informed of a whole list of alterations I needed to make; ingredients, baking times and temperatures and even digestion rates.  Apparently your food takes longer to digest at high altitudes.  So, I’ve been cutting down the baking powder, soda and sugar, adding more flour and raising the baking temps by about 25 degrees.  Our kitchen here is not as well stocked, utensil and cookware wise, as our Santa Cruz apartment so we’ve been improvising.  A fat separator makes a decent cup measure and a large stockpot works well as a mixing bowl.  The only bake ware we can put in the oven is a glass pie plate, but so far it’s worked quite well for baking a chicken, roasting vegetables, making granola, baked oatmeal and (my personal favorite) a giant chocolate chip cookie.