Friends and Family;
I find myself in La Paz, the capital city of Bolivia, and the highest capital city of the world, sitting at a startling 3600 meters high. This city certainly took a long time to get to, and I’ve been attempting to live to the fullest while I’m here on account of how difficult the trip was. First the bus ride from Cusco to Puno, in which we had to pass through a city where violent manifestations were occurring. Thankfully though, the only “incident” we really came across was a lone man standing in the street tending a garbage fire. He yelled at us as he went by. Next was a bus transfer onto the bus with the single worst set of shocks I have ever experienced, which made for interesting reading. We did eventually come to an area where we had to cross a finger of Lake Titicaca, where we disembarked as the bus was loaded (rather comically actually) onto a barge and shipped across the lake. The rest of the ride went off without a hitch, but it did mean 16 hours of travelling.
I met up with some friends that I had originally met in Arequipa, and we went and booked a bike tour of the local countryside. This is actually a fairly common sight to see while being a young, adrenaline-seeking backpacker in the area. The route is known rather famously as Death Road.
Don’t worry, I wore a helmet.
It was by far one of the funnest things I’ve ever done. We started at a gravel lot on the side of the road, gearing up and outfitting bikes before making our way onto the road and down 63 kilometers of smooth paved asphalt, which was incredibly fast. To our right, about 600 meters down the cliff face was a rusty looking bus that had run off the road in 1998 and killed just about everybody on board. The beautiful scenery rolled by, the road taking us lower and lower until we reached the entrance to the so-called Death Road.
The road itself is called Death Road for a reason, but the actual road has been maintained well enough so that two cars can pass by at the same time. Barely. For the 12 of us on bikes though, it was a piece of cake. The name itself comes from the 800 to 1200 meter plunge directly to your left as you speed down, bumping all the way. Our French guide was the type you’d expect to be leading all day tours down a road called Death Road, and he was a pretty cool guy.
This part of the trip was one of the instances where I’ve had the most fun so far, and we did get a t-shirt in the end with the ominous inscription: “I am a Death Road survivor” on the front. (Of course, along with the name of the company and where to find them online.)
The trip went off without a hitch, and I go back to the agency today to get my t-shirt refitted from the XL they gave me, and to get a hard disk with all of the photos that the agency took of us in our adrenaline-filled glory.
Once I say goodbye to my friends, I will be heading to the salt flats of Uyuni to take in their glory.
Until next we speak, I hope all goes well.
Global Thoroughfare 