oruro

this is not snow. the ground is completely covered with pea-sized pieces of hail. at first it was just raining, but then it started to hail, and as the hail got larger, it really started to hurt when it hit. luckily there was a small town along side of the highway, and i was able to take shelter under the overhang of a building. there were three other stranded bike riders waiting out the storm, and i ended up sharing my clif bars with them and showing them postcards of california.

i had my parents send a bunch of postcards to me so that i would have something to give people i met along the way. it's been really fun showing them to people. ironically enough, the most popular postcard is one of a green hill with a heard of black and white cows grazing on it. bolivians are really interested in the cows because they look different from bolivian cows. one farmer asked me if they were my cows. ha ha... i told him that i lived in a city and so i didn't know too much about cows.

so i totally got whatever sickness alice and claudia had. it was raining and hailing again the other day, and i just didn't feel very good, so i stopped riding at noon and got a really crappy hotel room for about $1.25. i ended up getting really sick and laying in bed for a day and a half with a bad fever. fortunately, there was this little kitty that hung out with me all the time, and that made me feel a lot better. i think the kitty had some kind of eye infection though. anyways, feeling mostly better today. being sick is a bummer. hope everyone is good! stay healthy. love,
-jessie