I finally got to see the film Quantum of Solace on DVD the other day, having missed it in the cinemas.

Part of the action supposedly takes place in Bolivia.  I say “supposedly”, because I recall that a number of outside shots were actually done in Chile – much to the anger of the local mayor, who objected to his community portraying Bolivians. (The area concerned had actually been part of Bolivia until 1883).

In fact, very few of the scenes were actually shot in Bolivia itself.  Even La Paz airport, which I was suspicious of when I first saw the scene, turned out to be at Farnborough in the UK!

But there were two things about the Bolivian scenes that I spotted right away.

Firstly, the roads.  Those roads to the hotel in the desert were too new!  I don’t remember the roads between the main towns being that good.  In fact, I remember in particular the road out of Potosí on the way to La Paz being of a high standard until about 5km north of the town.  Then it reverted to the usual dusty and bumy version for the rest of the journey.

However the line that really caught me off guard was at the party in La Paz.  The character Dominic Greene said that Bolivia had a water problem, because they had cut down so many trees that the topsoil had sliden into the sea.

Now, quite apart from the fact that I was not aware of such activities on Bolivia (I thought that was one of the problems in Africa…), which “sea” exactly would that be?