How NOT To End Up In A Bolivian Hospital
You’d think the chances of ending up in a Bolivian hospital while backpacking through South America would be slim… right?
Even if you’re an experienced traveller, backpacking can go wrong.
Some situations you just can’t plan for - your baggage not arriving with your connecting flight or being pickpocketed in a busy city, for example.
Then there are those situations that you definitely can avoid.
Those events that everybody warns you about, but you think, ‘No, I’ll be fine; it definitely won’t happen to me’.
Next thing you know, you’re bent over at the side of a back alley street in La Paz, you’re dizzy, feeling faint, desperately trying to call down a taxi to take you to the hospital, when all you really want to do is get on the next flight home.
We’re going to walk you through all of the mistakes we made while backpacking through South America, and give you handy little tips on how to avoid making them yourself.
Maybe, just this once, it’s actually worth listening to this advice so you will know how NOT to end up in a Bolivian Hospital while backpacking through South America.
Setting the Scene
So, to provide a little bit of context to this story, we were embarking on a 6-week backpacking trip through South America and had successfully made it through the first 4 weeks with our close friend Kasey.
We’d navigated all the way through Colombia, from the tropical climate of Cartagena in the North down to the infamous township of Medellin - once considered the most dangerous city in the world.
We moved on to the next country in South America. In Peru, we experienced incredible highs on a one-day trip to Machu Picchu, seeing the world’s largest birds in Colca Canyon and quad-biking through the Sacred Valley.
Up to this point, it had been an unbelievable adventure through the heart of Latin America. Once we got to Bolivia, however, things started to unravel…
With La Paz being a popular starting point to explore the infamous Amazon Rainforest, we booked ourselves onto an organised tour of the Bolivian Pampas - a 3-day adventure filled with Alligators, Capybaras, and Piranhas was in store.
At this point, it is worth noting that the actual Pampas Tour was spectacular! Cruising down the Amazon surrounded by truly mesmerising scenery, what’s not to love? Swimming with pink river dolphins was a particular highlight.
At the end of an unforgettable tour, we wished our guide and fellow travellers a fond farewell and got the plane back to La Paz, where we were due to explore the infamous Death Road and the otherworldly salt flats in Uyuni.
What actually transpired, though, was an entirely different experience altogether.
Our Bolivian Pampas trip had been doing well up to this point
Stage 1 - Unpleasant Symptoms
Once we arrived safely in La Paz, we booked ourselves into the hostel (thankfully, it was a private room) and tried to catch up on some rest.
Orla began to feel unwell at first. It started out with a stomach ache, then nausea, vomiting, and… well - there’s no need to go into too many details here, but as you can imagine, it wasn’t pretty.
Ben swiftly followed with some highly unpleasant symptoms, and then we were both in for one of the worst night sleeps we have ever experienced.
In the morning, our symptoms had not died down at all - they’d only got more severe. We figured we’d wait it out in the hostel, and thankfully, we were well stocked up on bottled water and drinks full of electrolytes, so we thought we’d let it pass.
It definitely didn’t pass…
It had got to the point where neither of us could stand up without feeling very faint. A few worried messages later from Orla’s Mum (threatening to get on a plane and force us to a hospital herself), coupled with the fact that we were no longer able to drink water without vomiting it back up immediately, we gave in and decided to get proper medical help.
Stage 2 - Getting to the Hospital
The gentleman running the hostel called us a taxi and instructed the driver to drop us off at the local medical clinic. Not the local hospital it must be said, but the one where naive tourists could be seen.
Thinking we were in safe hands, the taxi driver left us at the side of the road at the clinic and muttered something as he drove away, though we’re still not sure what ‘good luck’ is in Spanish.
We got to the clinic's front doors, on a random back alley street of La Paz, only to discover that the clinic was closed that day and there was no way of contacting anybody in case of emergency.
By this time, Ben had slumped into a heap at the roadside, feeling more faint than ever, as Orla desperately ran around trying to find another taxi.
Eventually, she managed to flag one down, only to realise that we’d both run out of Bolivianos (local currency). Digging deep into our emergency reserves, we managed to convince the new taxi driver, using a series of hand motions and vomiting gestures, to take us to a different clinic where we could finally get some treatment.
We had to give the taxi driver the only money we had on us, a crisp US$20 bill, the equivalent of 140 Bolivianos. He couldn’t believe his luck.
It remains one of our more expensive taxi rides to date - but certainly one of the most necessary.
Stage 3 - 48 hours in Hospital
A mere 24 hours from arriving back in La Paz, after our wonderful Pampas Tour experience, we were both hooked up to IV drips and being injected in places that you really don’t want to be injected.
Turns out that human bodies don’t react well to having salmonella and a parasite. Who’d have thought it? It was a rollercoaster ride of a 24 hours, that’s for sure.
Despite us not being able to communicate a single word to the doctors and nurses, there was a mutual understanding between us all that we just wanted to stop vomiting and then we would happily be on our way.
The hospital itself was actually very well run - it was clean, the staff were friendly and they had us booked in and taken care of within minutes of stumbling out of the taxi.
We don’t recall feeling this happy…
Stage 4 - Travel Insurance Fiasco
Mercifully, the vomiting concluded pretty quickly, but the broken English questions about our travel insurance did not subside so easily.
Wisely, Ben had chosen to take out insurance with World Nomads. You’ll probably have heard of them, as almost every travel blogger since 2010 has recommended using them, which is why they feature in our recommendations for affordable travel insurance.
He knew this because he had booked his travel insurance on the plane on the way to Bogota. He had done a quick scour of the internet - by ‘quick’, we’re talking a maximum of 30 seconds - and booked the first recommended travel insurance he could see.
World Nomads really know what they’re doing, and so it transpired when, one quick phone call later, the hospital had received full payment for Ben’s treatment and were satisfied that he could be discharged without second thought.
Orla, on the other hand, had used a much more systematic approach when booking her travel insurance.
At least 3 months prior to the beginning of the Backpacking adventure, she had already researched numerous travel insurance companies.
She weighed up the pros and cons of each company, drawing pie charts and collecting data to compile onto a spreadsheet to analyse the packages available from each insurance company. She even founded her own company to see if she could compete in the heavily congested market of travel insurance brokers… or something like that; there was a lot of research anyway!
After all the analysis, she plumped for a travel insurance package from a company called Multitrip.com. She was confident that her carefully assessed travel insurer would provide the same assistance and ease as Ben’s. The reality was quite different.
Thankfully, Ben’s eldest brother happens to work in the law industry back in the UK, so when repeated calls for the travel insurance company to pay out fell on deaf ears, he was quickly on the case.
Multiple strongly worded emails and costly hours spent on hold later, there was still no reply from Multitrips.com.
Our diet for 2 days
At this point, we were just desperate to leave the hospital. We’d been there for over two days and were feeling physically fine. A diet of dry crackers, tea and apples wasn’t quite substantial enough for us. Besides, we had a flight to Brazil to catch the next morning!
So we decided to take the hit, abandon Orla’s travel insurance company, and pay for her treatment on Ben’s debit card.
It remains one of our more expensive accommodation options to date - but certainly one of the most necessary.
It took a full 4 months for the travel insurance company to pay back all the money we were owed finally, and even that was only because Orla’s Dad had rang them pretending to be in tears, claiming that their entire family’s Christmas was going to be ruined because they hadn’t received the money.
Incidentally, we did manage to make the flight to Iguazu, Brazil.
Orla donning the very fashionable hospital gown
Tips you can take to avoid this happening to you
Now that you’ve heard the story, it’s time to tell you about the mistakes we made that contributed to our disastrous 48 hours in La Paz. If we’d have followed our own advice, we’d probably not have ended up in hospital in the first place.
Tip 1: Only drink bottled water
This tip is so simple, and everybody who has travelled has heard it. Do NOT drink unbottled water while abroad unless you are using a LifeStraw or some filtration tablet.
It sounds like pretty simple advice to follow, but sometimes you have to look ahead and be prepared for the eventuality of having no bottled water available.
Take our Pampas tour, for example - we took a few bottles of water with us on the trip, but our day bags couldn’t carry that many. Midway through the trip, we ran out and asked our guide to provide us with some. Unfortunately, as we were in the middle of the Amazon, there was a very limited supply, so we were offered some water in bottles, but the bottles had clearly already been opened.
We were never made aware of where the water had actually come from, but when it’s 35 degrees outside, any water seems better than none.
Tip 2: Don’t ask for Ice Cubes
Another mistake we made was to give into temptation on a very hot day and take a drink with ice cubes.
We had just come back from anaconda hunting and it was swelteringly hot outside. Once we got to the accommodation, we couldn’t resist. Again, we have no idea whether the ice cubes were made with fresh bottled water or just regular Bolivian tap water - something our weak European bodies wouldn’t be able to handle.
Tip 3: Avoid eating Salad
At home, we are constantly told to eat our fruit and vegetables and eat as healthily as possible. For the most part, while travelling, you can live by this mantra, too.
Eating at restaurants makes it easy to assess whether you think it looks clean and then choose your meal accordingly.
However, when travelling in the middle of the Pampas, it’s best to stick to food that has to be cooked. Cooking the food will kill off any bacteria that your body won’t be able to handle. Salad is typically washed in water before being served, and if that water isn’t filtered bottled water, you risk it making you very ill.
Step 4: Don’t eat Piranha
We can’t conclusively say that this is the reason we became ill. In fact, it was more than likely a combination of all the mistakes we made during our Pampas trip, but it’s still worth mentioning anyway.
As part of the experience, we went Piranha fishing and were lucky enough to be served the Piranha we caught for dinner that night.
Little did we know that the Piranha would be deep-fried whole - eyes and bones and all.
We’d come all the way to Bolivia, so we weren’t going to pass up the opportunity of sampling fresh piranha.
Probably not our wisest move.
Hey, it makes for a good story though. Right?
Tip 5: Remember to stock up on medical supplies
We’re not sure if this would have helped in our situation, but it’s always best to keep a good supply of tablets and potions from your country. Ones that you trust and know will help your body.
Carrying around things for headaches, stomach troubles and anything in between can be very handy when backpacking. There’s nothing worse than being in the middle of a busy city, having to wade through droves of people to try and find the nearest pharmacy.
Bonus Tip: Take out Reliable, Affordable Travel Insurance
If there is one singular thing to take from this article, it is this - book your travel insurance via SafetyWing or World Nomads. At least that way, if you are silly enough to ignore all of the advice we have just proposed, you’ll have the backing of a reliable insurance policy to bail you out when you're 10,000km away from home.
Working out what is covered in your insurance is certainly one of things you need to know before backpacking through South America.
