Potosi · With kids

A municipal aquarium housed in the old colonial water cisterns, listed by the city tourism office among its museums. Small, indoors and warm, which counts for a great deal here.

The church museum opens a roof terrace over the tiled roofs of the centre with Cerro Rico behind. It is a short climb and children usually take to it better than to another colonial interior.

The flattest, sunniest place in the centre and the one spot where an afternoon of doing nothing is the correct plan. Benches, pigeons, ice cream and the slow first day that the altitude requires anyway.

Potosí's biggest festival, recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage in 2023, brings more than 120 dance groups and brass bands through the streets around the feast of San Bartolomé. Loud, long and crowded, and the one time of year the city is unmistakably enjoying itself.

At 4,067m children tire quickly, sleep badly and can be quietly unwell without saying so. Come up from Sucre rather than arriving straight from low ground, plan one thing a day, and treat the first afternoon as lost.