Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
and showing school children around the park. Conservation-centred tour operator
Madidi
Travel
,onCalleComercioinRurrenabaque( 038922153,
madidi-travel.com
),alsowel-
comes volunteers to help out with both their Rurrenabaque office and private rainforest re-
serve; jungle-based volunteers get room and board.
Paid work
Unless you have arranged something in advance with an international company or non-gov-
ernment organization, your chances of finding paid work in Bolivia are slim. The best bet is
teaching English
in La Paz, Cochabamba or Santa Cruz, though pay is low unless you get
work with the British Council or a similar international agency - this is best arranged in ad-
vance. Obviously, work as a teacher is easier to find if you have a formal TEFL qualification.
Even if you do find paid employment, getting an official work permit is a costly and long-
drawn-out bureaucratic nightmare - contact the
migración
in La Paz or any other major city
for details.
Mail
Letters and postcards
sent by airmail (
por avión
) to Europe and North America tend to take
between one and two weeks to arrive; the rest of the world outside the Americas and Europe
takes longer. Letters cost about Bs10-15 to Europe, the US, Canada, Australia or New Zeal-
and. For a small extra charge, you can send letters
certified
(
certificado
), which is more reli-
able, but even then it's not a good idea to send anything you can't afford to lose.
Parcels
up to 2kg can be airmailed from major post offices; this costs about Bs100 per kilo
to Europe and about half that to North America; the contents must be checked by a customs
officer in a post office before being sealed. There's no point sending anything from small
town post offices, as you'll almost certainly reach the nearest city or large town before your
letter or package does. If you have to send anything particularly important or urgent inter-
nationally, it's worth splashing out and using one of the internationally recognized
courier
services
: FedEx and DHL have offices in major cities.
If you wish to
receive mail
in Bolivia, you can do so through the
poste restante
service
available in most post offices - it's best to use those in major towns or cities. Have mail
sent to “Lista de Correos, Correo Central, the town concerned, Bolivia”, and make sure your
surname is written in capitals and as obviously as possible, as your post will be filed under
whatever the clerk thinks your surname is; if you suspect something sent to you has gone
astray, ask them to check under your first name too. Mail is usually held for about three
months, and you'll need your passport to collect it.
Maps
No two maps of Bolivia are identical, and none is absolutely accurate. Most errors are made
in the mapping of
dirt roads and tracks
: some maps mark them incorrectly as proper roads;
