We left at 9:10 a.m. after getting gasolina especial in Villa Montes. It cost Bs 3.74/ US $.54 a litre (cheaper than Argentina which was US$.89 a litre and much cheaper than Brazil which was US $1.62 a litre). By the way, because the octane of Bolivian unleaded gasoline is not high enough, Dimitri has the attendant put some kind of octane booster/additiva into the tank. He says that should help.
We couldn't get the red caked mud off of the car because no car wash was open on Sunday. There was some discussion about whether the election on autonomy would mean that we couldn't travel but we stopped at the gate and paid our first toll of Bs3 and were allowed to pass.
We had a fabulous 5 hour trip on a great paved road. The views weren't spectacular but the surface of the road was great and the farmland was green. There were many toll gate stops along the way. The deal is this. When you pass through a toll gate, you pay your money and get a little piece of rectangular paper. Then at future toll gates, you show the rectangular papers, one is stamped and are allowed to pass. Or not. In that case it is necessary to pay an additional toll. And, you get another rectangular piece of paper. By the end of our drive we had paid Bs 33/US$4.78 in tolls and had a wad of little rectangular pieces of paper to show and get stamped from time to time.
We had little traffic, I enjoyed driving for a change and we had no problem with the vote on autonomy that day. To see an interesting article on the vote in Tarija Province click here.
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