La Paz
La Paz’s best-preserved colonial street is home to four small museums. They are all clustered together and can generally be bundled into one visit. Buy…
Must-see attractions in Bolivia
La Paz
The city’s most unusual market lies along Calles Jiménez and Linares between Sagárnaga and Av Mariscal Santa Cruz, amid lively tourist artesanías (stores…
Bolivia
The world's largest salt flat sits at a lofty 3653m (11,985ft) and blankets an amazing 12,000 sq km (4633 sq miles). It was part of a prehistoric salt…
Bolivia
As you might have guessed from the dinosaur figure in the plaza or the dinosaur head sticking out of city hall, Torotoro has become synonymous with…
La Paz
This colonial building was constructed in 1775 of pink sandstone and has been restored to its original grandeur, in mestizo (mixed) baroque and Andino…
Museo de Textiles Andinos Bolivianos
La Paz
Fans of Bolivia’s lovely traditional weaving consider this small textile museum a must-see. Examples of the country’s finest traditional textiles …
Museo de Etnografía y Folklore
La Paz
Anthropology buffs should check out this museum, one of the city's best. The building, itself a real treasure, was constructed in 1720 and was once the…
Bolivia
The Río Umajalanta, which disappears beneath a layer of limestone approximately 22m thick, has formed the impressive Umajalanta Cavern, of which 4.5km of…
Amazon Basin
The Santuario Chuchini (Jaguar's Lair) is one of the few easily accessible Paitití sites. This wildlife sanctuary and camp sits on an 8-hectare loma …
Cochabamba
This immense Christ statue standing atop Cerro de San Pedro (2800m) behind Cochabamba is the second largest of its kind in the world. It's 44cm higher…
Sucre
For a dose of Bolivian history, it’s hard to beat this museum where the Bolivian declaration of independence was signed on August 6, 1825. It has been…
Cochabamba
The noble, timeworn Convento de Santa Teresa is straight out of a Gabriel García Márquez novel. Guided tours (around 45 minutes) of this gracefully…
Cochabamba
Nothing symbolizes Bolivia's gilded mineral age like tin baron Simón Patiño's European-style Palacio Portales. Though he never actually inhabited this…
Salar de Uyuni
One of the highlights of a Salar de Uyuni tour is a hike around the spectacular Isla Incahuasi, otherwise known as Inkawasi. It's located in the heart of…
Bolivia
Despite the presence of other camera-wielding gringos and the ubiquity of travel agencies in Sucre selling 'tours,' Tarabuco's Sunday market is well worth…
Lake Titicaca
The sparkling white mudéjar (Moorish–style) cathedral, with its domes and colorful azulejos (blue Portuguese-style ceramic tiles), dominates the town…
Bolivia
A popular excursion, San Pedro Cave, known in the Aymará language as Chussek Uta (House of Owls), is approximately 500m deep, with an enclosed lagoon that…
La Senda Verde Wildlife Sanctuary
Bolivia
At 12-hectare Senda Verde, there's a new concept: humans are 'caged' while most of the 200-plus monkeys run free. This protects people and monkeys alike …
Reserva Nacional de Fauna Andina Eduardo Avaroa
Bolivia
Tucked away in the southwestern corner of Los Lípez near the Chilean border is the remote Reserva Nacional de Fauna Andina Eduardo Avaroa. It's a rough…
Sucre
This superb museum of indigenous arts is a must for anyone interested in the indigenous groups of the Sucre area, focusing particularly on the woven…
Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz's lush botanical gardens, 12km east of the city center, make for a tranquil escape from the urban scene. Covering more than 200 hectares, the…
La Capilla Sixtina del Altiplano
Bolivia
Like its famous counterpart in Vatican City, the interior of this lovely adobe-and-thatch church is covered with frescoes. But unlike the other Sistine…
Museo Nacional de Etnografía y Folklore
Sucre
Known locally as MUSEF and housed in the impressive former Banco Nacional building, this museum brings together a series of fascinating temporary…
Lake Titicaca
This is a beautifully preserved village where the homes are built with flat stones joined in an earthen mortar. There is a stone church on the hilltop…
Museo Etnoarqueológico Kenneth Lee
Amazon Basin
Named for the gringo querido del Beni, the beloved white man of the Beni, this small museum north of the center is considered the city's top cultural…
Bolivia
The nearest thing Bolivia has to Peru’s Machu Picchu is this remote, rarely visited site (meaning ‘Land of the Inca’), 132km east of Cochabamba on a flat…
Bolivia
The prominent rock outcrop known as the Devil’s Molar (3825m) is actually an extinct volcanic plug that rises between the Río Choqueyapu and the suburban…
Bolivia
The ruins of Inca-Rakay, in the Serranía de Tarhuani, are the most readily accessible ruins in the Cochabamba Valley, but they are mostly crumbling stone…
La Paz
The hewed stone basilica of San Francisco was founded in 1548 by Fray Francisco de los Ángeles. The original structure collapsed under heavy snowfall…
Bolivia
The 5395m-high Cerro Chacaltaya peak atop a former glacier is a popular day trip. The glacier diminished over several decades and, tragically, had melted…
La Paz
Although it’s a relatively recent addition to La Paz’s religious structures, the 1835 cathedral is impressive – mostly because it is built on a steep…
La Paz
As in many Latin American cemeteries, bodies are first buried in the Western way or are placed in a crypt. Then, within 10 years, they are disinterred and…
Amazon Basin
Thanks to the efforts of the conservation NGO Armonía, the endangered blue-throated macaw or barba azul has become something of a regional celebrity in…
Parque Nacional Serranía del Aguaragüe
Bolivia
The long and narrow 1080 sq km Aguaragüe National Park takes in much of the mountains of Serranía del Aguaragüe, which divide the vast Gran Chaco and the…
Amazon Basin
Created in 1988, this 622,600ha park has some of Bolivia’s most easily explored cloud forest. It skirts a large portion of the road between Cochabamba and…
Reserva Nacional de Flora y Fauna Tariquía
Bolivia
The lovely and little-known 2470 sq km Tariquía Flora & Fauna Reserve (created in 1989) protects a large portion of cloud forest and a smaller area of…
Isla del Sol
Isla del Sol's most spectacular ruins lie near the island’s northern tip. Its main feature is the Palacio del Inca, a maze of stone walls and tiny…
Parque Nacional Noel Kempff Mercado
Amazon Basin
The wonderfully remote and globally important Noel Kempff Mercado National Park is home to a broad spectrum of Amazonian flora and fauna and has a wide…
Sucre
It seems that 65 million years ago the site of Sucre’s Fabrica Nacional de Cemento SA (Fancesa) cement quarry, 5km north of the center, was the place to…
Bolivia
About 10km down the canyon of the Río Choqueyapu from the city center, Valle de la Luna is a slightly over-hyped place, though it’s a pleasant break from…
