Aside from its cultured, artistic air, Sopocachi District also boasts some of the best restaurants and night life in La Paz. It’s definitely worth a stop during your visit to Bolivia’s capital city.
In this post, we’ve compiled our favorite activities to do in Sopocachi:
The steep terrain, narrow streets, and dense population of La Paz caused years of transportation issues which have been alleviated in recent years by a novel solution: the world’s largest urban cable-car system. For a city shaped like a bowl nestling in a ring of Andean peaks, these lines running up and down the hillsides is ideal. At 13,000ft above sea level, this cable-car ride is also the highest in the world. If you’d like to know more about riding above the world’s highest capital, read on!
The U.S.’s WWF and Mexico’s Lucha Libre may be more famous, but if you want the craziest wrestling spectacle for your buck, you need to attend a Cholita Wrestling match in La Paz. Locals and tourists alike gather each Sunday evening to watch the theatrics. Like those of its predecessors, the highly entertaining matches are staged to showcase different tricks and storylines rather than truly fought, and the storylines emphasize humor and social justice. The uniquely entertaining matches are part of the culture of La Paz, with a surprisingly long history.
The North Yungas Road connects La Paz, Bolivia to the small town of Coroico in the tropical Yungas region. It was built by Paraguayan prisoners during the Chaco War of the 1930s and quickly gained notoriety, although it wasn’t christened the world’s most dangerous road until 1995, by the Inter-American Development Bank. At some points, the narrow, single-lane road’s sharp curves and sheer drops led to vehicles falling off, especially during the rainy season. (You can even search for videos of this happening on Youtube.) After a new alternative road was built, the Yungas Road became much less frequently transited by vehicles. At the same time, it became a popular tourist destination attracting mountain biking thrill-seekers…
One of Bolivia’s largest festivals of the year is just around the corner: the Fiesta del Gran Poder, which is marked by an endless succession tens of thousands of brightly dressed dancers and marching bands parading for miles along the city’s main streets. They are organized into associations representing the neighborhoods, community groups, and companies of La Paz. Performers dance for around 5 hours, in spite of costumes averaging more than 50 pounds. Meanwhile, on the sidelines, locals and travelers alike gather to down copious amounts of beer while shouting street vendors enthusiastically sell their wares.