Have I mentioned yet that Rurre is ridiculously hot? It bears repeating. We spent less than two days in the jungle-side town and only received respites from the nasty, sticky moisture between 3AM to 6AM—not really prime time to enjoy it.

Surprisingly, the sweat does not bring an inordinate amount of biting bugs, although the super-intensive Ultrathon deet-soaked lotion we slathered on with our 40SPF sunblock may have helped. There was so little of interest to us in Rurrenabaque that the heat was what we focused on. Sweating up one street, sweating down another, it was truly difficult to even motivate for meals.

Hemmy feels a bit warm

After being in Torotoro, the sheer volume of tourists was shocking. Rurre's a small town and the gringos seem to far outnumber the locals. And this was low season, evidenced by the relative dryness (probably "only" 70% humidity in September) and the lack of tourists actually taking jungle and pampas tours...everyone was just hanging out. Hemmy and I aren't really hippie enough to enjoy the local scene.

To cater to tourists, this town of no more than a few thousand people features no less than 4 karaoke bars and more pizza joints than my neighborhood in Brooklyn. Internet cafes on every corner. Laundry service everywhere, good for the sweat-stains. Many English-speakers. Bars full of backpackers, including the "world-famous" Moskkito Bar—although which world was not specified.

Despite all the tourists and the international flair, the Bolivian character still showed through in Rurrenabaque. One of the better examples came when Hemmy needed to burn her photos onto CD.

Almost every Internet place claimed to do this service. Most even went so far as to PAINT this information along their walls .So when proprietors with "CD BURNING" adorning the sides of the business would simply smile and shake their heads at our request, we had to understand it was just another part of Bolivian mentality. Along the lines of saying "we are leaving now" but meaning "we will leave at some point today," advertising CD burning meant "maybe someday we will have that capability but we find it best to start attracting customers now." Similarly, when we found a place to burn a photo CD, it called itself FastNet with an odd wall mural listing its services including internet, but of course did not have internet and the staff seemed puzzled why we would ask such a thing.

After trying almost every spot in Rurre looking for a place that featured both services, my shirt was soaked through and I had difficulty finding this amusing.

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