Practical Information for visiting Bolivia

The currency is the boliviano (BOB). Bolivia is very much a cash economy — cards are accepted in better hotels and restaurants in La Paz and Santa Cruz Department and almost nowhere else.

ATMs are available in the cities and larger towns and can be unreliable; withdraw more than you need before heading to Uyuni, the Amazon or rural areas. Carry small notes, since change for a 200-boliviano note is genuinely hard to find.

US dollars can be changed easily and are sometimes accepted for tours and lodges. Bring clean, unmarked notes — damaged ones are refused.

Bargaining is normal in markets and for taxis, which are unmetered; agree the fare first.

Tipping is modest: rounding up in restaurants, and a proper tip for guides and drivers on multi-day tours, which is a significant part of their income.

Coverage for mobile networks reaches the cities, the altiplano towns and the main roads, with 4G in urban areas from Entel, Tigo and Viva. It thins fast in the Amazon, the Chaco Boreal and the high cordilleras, and on a Uyuni tour there is no signal for most of three days.

Local SIMs are cheap and sold everywhere with a passport. Data prices are low.

Wi-Fi is common in hotels and cafes in the cities and slow to nonexistent in the countryside. Amazon lodges and salt hotels generally have none, and say so.

Power cuts occur, and at altitude cold drains batteries faster than people expect. Download maps and carry a power bank.

Bolivia is reasonably safe for visitors and violent crime against them is uncommon, but it is not absent: armed robbery and assault have occurred at tourist destinations. The genuine hazards are altitude, roads, protest — and one region to stay out of.

The Chapare. Avoid all travel to the Chapare region, including Villa Tunari and the major highway routes crossing it, for an unstable security situation, anti-foreigner sentiment, elevated civil unrest, restrictions on movement, and drug-trafficking-related crime including kidnapping. Violent and drug-related crime is concentrated there — between Santa Cruz Department and Cochabamba — in the Yungas north-east of La Paz, and in the border areas with Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Peru.

The fake-police scam, and the right that defeats it. Criminals pose as police officers and ask to examine your belongings, or to have you accompany them to a bogus police station — sometimes working with an accomplice posing as a taxi driver or as another traveller. Under Bolivian law there is no obligation to go to a police station with an officer unless they hold a formal written request from a judge with your name on it, and any search or seizure must happen at a genuine police station in the prosecutor's presence. If someone claiming to be a local authority stops you, ask to see their official identification. Never get into an unmarked taxi, and never go anywhere with someone claiming to be a plain-clothes officer.

Protest is a normal form of political expression here, and it closes roads. Strikes occur frequently and often nationwide. In the spring of 2026 several weeks of protests and roadblocks interrupted fuel, food and medical supply chains badly enough to raise humanitarian concerns; most routes have since reopened, but some roads were damaged and the situation could deteriorate quickly. Avoid protests and blockades, particularly around government buildings and central La Paz including Plaza Murillo. A 90-day nationwide state of emergency was declared on 20 June 2026 to let security forces clear blockades; it imposed no curfew and no general restriction on movement, but localised limits can be introduced where operations are underway, so check the current advisory before you go. What to do when a road is closed is on Getting Around.

Everyday theft. Pickpocketing and purse snatching are common in the large cities, La Paz and Santa Cruz Department included, targeting tourist areas and public transport, and theft also occurs in unofficial taxis. Criminals work in organised groups, one distracting while an accomplice steals — staging a fight, blocking a pavement, throwing liquid on you and then offering to clean it up, or using a child to draw you somewhere separate. Knowing the script is most of the defence. Card skimming happens too: cover the keypad, watch anyone handling your card, use ATMs inside a bank or a business, and avoid readers with an unusual feature.

Altitude is the most likely thing to affect you, and it affects almost everyone to some degree. Treat it as the single most important preparation for this country, and read the health section before you book the itinerary rather than after.

Road accidents are the leading cause of visitor deaths. Bus crashes on mountain roads are not rare, and which company you choose is a safety decision — the detail is on Getting Around.

Mine tours at Potosí involve real danger — dust, heat, unstable workings and explosives. Drug offences carry long sentences in poor conditions, and there are scams in which drugs are hidden in an object or a bag handed to a traveller to carry.

Women travelling alone may be subject to some forms of harassment or verbal abuse. Drink spiking has been reported in nightclubs, in bars and restaurants, and on public transport including street taxis — never leave a drink unattended.

Altitude is the defining health issue. La Paz is at 3,600 metres and El Alto airport at 4,061. Arriving directly from sea level, most people feel it: headache, breathlessness, poor sleep, nausea. Ascend slowly if you can, rest on the first day, avoid alcohol, drink water, and consider acetazolamide. Coca tea helps mildly. Severe symptoms — confusion, breathlessness at rest, a persistent cough — require immediate descent, and that is not negotiable.

Medical facilities are limited outside La Paz and Santa Cruz Department, where private clinics are adequate. Serious cases are evacuated abroad, so insurance with evacuation cover is essential, and check it covers altitude above 4,000 metres, which some policies exclude.

Vaccinations: routine cover plus hepatitis A and typhoid. Yellow fever is required for the lowlands and is checked at some borders. Rabies for longer rural stays.

Malaria and dengue are present in the Amazon and the lowlands, not on the altiplano.

Do not drink tap water. The sun at altitude burns extremely fast — high-factor sunscreen, hat and sunglasses are essential even when it is cold.

Greet before anything else. Buenos días on entering a shop or approaching someone, and a handshake. Skipping it is read as rude.

Photography. Always ask before photographing people, particularly Indigenous women in traditional dress, and expect to be refused or asked for payment. There is a long history here of being photographed as a curiosity, and the reluctance is entirely reasonable.

Coca leaf is legal in Bolivia, chewed and drunk widely, and offering or accepting it is a normal courtesy. It is illegal to take it out of the country, including in tea bags, and border officials do check.

Drug law is zero-tolerance, and penalties for possession, use or trafficking are severe: lengthy prison sentences and heavy fines. The trap to know about is not possession but carriage — travellers have been caught out by drugs hidden inside an object or a bag that an acquaintance asked them to bring into or out of Bolivia, and dating websites are a recognised source of that scam. Carry nothing for anyone.

Identification. Police and immigration officials conduct occasional identity checks, and you may be asked for your passport when checking into a hotel or other accommodation.

Pachamama. If you are offered a drink, a small amount is poured on the ground first as an offering before anyone drinks. Follow your host’s lead.

Dress modestly in the highlands, where conservative norms hold and where it is cold anyway.

Do not discuss the loss of the coastline lightly — it is a genuine national grievance and not a joke.

Emergency numbers: 110 for police and 119 for the fire service. Ambulance cover is local rather than national — in La Paz the ambulance line is 165. There is a gender-based violence line on 800-14-0348, and a tourist police unit in La Paz on +591 2 222-5016, which is the better first call for a theft or a lost passport. English is unlikely on any of them; your hotel or guide will usually be faster and more effective.

Medical. Private clinics in La Paz and Santa Cruz Department are the realistic option — Clinica Alemana and Clinica del Sur in La Paz among them. Payment is required up front, in cash. Public facilities have limited resources, rural areas have little access to care at all, and in remote areas it can take days to be seen. Anything serious means evacuation, usually to Santa Cruz Department first and then abroad.

Altitude emergencies. Descent is the treatment. La Paz’s lower Zona Sur is several hundred metres below the centre and is where people are taken first; from El Alto, going down to La Paz itself is a meaningful drop. Note that some air ambulance providers cannot fly into high-altitude locations such as La Paz, so an evacuation from the altiplano may not be available on demand.

Blockades and disruption. Check road status before intercity travel; tour operators and hotels track it closely and are the best source.

Keep offline copies of your passport, insurance, yellow fever certificate and enough cash in dollars to change at short notice. Most embassies are in La Paz’s Sopocachi and Calacoto districts.