I met Sarah and Kristen in Sydney later that morning. Sarah I've know for almost two years and Kristen I met that day! Yes, I suppose it is a little unusual to travel for five weeks with someone you don't know but given we had a mutual friend whom has a fairly rigorous screening process for friends, I was quite confident it wouldn't be an issue.
We arrived in Santiago, Chile about the same time and day we left Sydney. That always messes with my head and also my body clock. We managed to push through until about 5:30pm until none of us could keep our eyes open. We were up damn early the next morning (2:15am) to make our way to La Paz, Bolivia.
La Paz, Bolivia
We flew into the half finished, brick city that lays in a dust bowl of a valley more than 3500m above sea level. Don't get me wrong, La Paz may not be aesthetically pleasing but it is a city that everyone should visit once in their lifetime.
The city is a mixture of traditional Bolivia, tourism and a modernization of their own culture. The city is dotted with 'Cholita' women. Dressed in their distinct traditional outfits of knitted cardigans, layered calf length skirts, long socks, black shoes & multicolored sling backpacks, their get up would not be complete without long plaits and a top hat.
They're extremely friendly when they are selling you something like their tasty cheesy bread or bottled water. With short statures and heavy set frames, their low center of gravity and their gait somewhere between a jog and a walk, we dubbed these women 'the impassables'. You don't want to get in the way of a Cholita on a mission. Kristen found out the hard way you will come off second best with either broken ribs or a ruptured spleen when she was t-boned by one on the street. Beware that they are not just fabric underneath their exterior.
We checked into our notorious hostel Loki (http://www.lokihostel.com/). Notorious for its party reputation which we found out about that night around 11:30pm. Not an ideal selection as far as accommodation goes when you are three nanna's suffering extreme jet-lag! We wandered through the city streets of La Paz and had dinner at Layka restaurant to try the coca tea (which is supposed to help with the effects of altitude) and lama steaks. We all gave lama the ticket of approval and the girls thought that 'lama paramas' would have potential to take off back home.
Our first full day in La Paz we took our chances with the $1 empanada (cheese bread) from a Cholita.
Not knowing exactly what we had bought, we though the dough wasn't cooked properly in the middle. I proceeded to tip the runny mess out when Sarah informed me that it was in fact ricotta and I was wasting the best part! They were delicious but a bit of a handful to manage whilst eating on the go.
We navigated through the streets to find the red line cable car which for 6 Bolivianos ($1.50) you can take a return journey to the top of the city for some spectacular views of La Paz and the surrounding mountains.
After a sticky beak at the witches markets where many a bird and llama foetuses were to be seen we had a quick drink stop at a pub before checking out the San Francisco church.
We had an 'English speaking guide' who could barely speak English but It was still a worthwhile venture. After a viewing of the government building and the center square of La Paz We had a late lunch even though none of us felt like eating.
Altitude is a funny thing. We all handled the high altitude fairly well, aside from maxing out our heart rates each time we had to climb a flight of stairs. It can effect your sleep and wake you up as though you are having a panic attack. It also dulls your appetite. We were lucky to feel like eating at all whilst in La Paz. We felt satisfied enough with one meal a day. I don't know if it was the altitude or La Paz's dry climate but I constantly felt thirsty and my mouth was bone dry. I couldn't drink enough. I would wake up multiple times a night for water and to put pawpaw cream on my lips.
An hour later we were kiting up in our buffs, helmets, gloves, jacket, pants and being fitted to our bikes.
The nervous energy was tangible but excitement was also there. The ride starts off on Yungas Rd on asphalt. It's about 22km of downhill but we would stop every few kilometers to regroup and make sure everyone was still alive. At the end of that section was the optional extra to ride the next 8km which included some 'gradual' inclines. Those gradual inclines were not so gradual and at over 4000m the air was noticeably thin. Of course we accepted the challenge and were happy to have a sandwich meet us when we were done. That also meant the official start of Death Rd. It is a 32km single lane, downhill, dirt road that is open to road traffic in both directions. Some of the cliff faces are sheer drops of over 550m with not much more than a meter between the edge and the left wheel rut in which we were riding. Downhill traffic must give way to uphill which means if two cars meet the downhill vehicle has to reverse until the other can pass. This has lead to numerous road fatalities over many years which is why it has earned itself the tile of 'the world's most dangerous road'. Thankfully in 2006 a new highway was constructed to reduced the need for vehicles to use it which has reduced traffic and fatalities on this road.
It took me a few kilometers to warm up to it but soon I was in my element. I haven't done a lot of mountain biking but I'm sure all the road riding I've done was beneficial. I had to make sure I didn't get too cocky as there were baby's heads popping up all over the place. Baby's heads are large rocks that could end your day by death! Sarah and Kristen overcame their fears of heights to soon be cruising downhill dodging baby's heads and a couple numfies like 'full face' who decided that a full face helmet, knee and elbow pads were vital for him after stacking it on the first 20m of dirt road- red flag alert!
Every now and then I got the urge to look out to the left which usually turned into a death wobble and jelly legs. It was better not to look. We stopped frequently for photos, water and to shake out the hands. Our two guides; Mo & Rodriguez kept the front and the rear covered and our sag wagon bus followed behind with our gear and supplies. At the last stop we had 8km to go. I set off to which Kristen alerted me to a flat tyre! Just my luck! Rodriguez did a quick change and I was soon fanging down the last few k's into Coroico to be greeted by a cold beer. The high was spectacular but the adventure of the day wasn't done there. We jumped in the back of a truck and drove 4km back up death Rd to do three ziplines over the valley. I had peer pressured the other two into pre-booking this about a month ago without knowledge of their fear of heights. I went for the face first superman option with a guide and the other two went solo. It was the icing on the cake for a full day of adrenaline.
We headed to Senda Verde animal refugee for a much needed early pasta dinner before one of the worst bus trips of my life. It was a three hour trip back to La Paz on the new road which I questioned as to why it was better that the old road. As we were leaving Coroico the road is still very much like Death Rd; narrow with a sizable drop off the side. We meet a truck coming uphill so we had to back up to a widening to allow it to pass. At that moment I almost saw my pasta dinner! Once on the highway it became apparent that blind corners, double lines and oncoming traffic didn't mean anything if you wanted to overtake another vehicle. I thought I wasn't going to make it back to La Paz but by then I was so far beyond exhaustion I fell asleep in the most awkward of positions. Once we were dropped off a block from our hostel I was so disorientated by fatigue I had no idea where I was until I was practically standing outside of Loki. After much needed showers we all collapsed into bed.
We were all a bit sore and sorry the next morning and were happy to find bacon, eggs and decent coffee nearby. We packed up, checked out and jumped into a cab to head out to Motorcycle Tours Bolivia (http://www.motorcycletoursbolivia.com/site/) near moon valley in Southern La Paz for a morning of quad biking. The man at the shop looked somewhat nervous when he saw the three of us coming. I can't tell you how many times I heard him say 'please be careful' and 'safety first'. We got decked out in our bikie gear, did a lap around the block on the quads with the instructors and were given the tick of approval to go.
Our guide that day was John. He was unbelievable. He worked out pretty quickly that none of us were princesses and had the need for speed! Kristen needed to 'negotiate' with the police as she didn't have her Aussie licence with her. John took Kristen's phone for the two hour tour of Moon Valley taking photos and videos with it whilst guiding us at speed and fending off wild dogs. We had a few photo stops at the top of Luna Valle where once again the girl's fear of heights were realized.
It was really fun way to end our time in La Paz speeding through the streets and Moon Valley on quad bikes, waving to the locals. I'm pretty sure our mothers would all have had heart attacks if we had of told them this was on the agenda. I thought I saw the man at the shop breath a sigh of relief and wipe his brow when the three of us walked in unscathed, raving about our morning and returning his quad bikes intact. We jumped a cab to head off to the airport which was an adventure in itself. The cabbie took a short cut up a steep dirt road and at one point I thought Sarah and I may have to get out and push. We checked in for our 4pm flight at 2pm to be told that we were supposed to be boarding right then for a 2:30pm flight! Apparently Amazonas airline is renowned for its unreliability and change of flights without notifying passengers. We tore through airport security, grabbed a muffin and flew down the stairs to the gate where it was unmanned. Kristen and Sarah ran through the door and almost made it onto the tarmac before anyone stopped them! I was a little disappointed not to see them get taken down by airport security but no-one seemed overly concerned about the security breech. Our flight ended up being delayed until 4:30pm anyway and we were just relieved to get on-board as we had been told there was the possibility that it would be cancelled.
Rurrenabaque, Bolivia
Around 5:30pm our tiny little plane landed in the town of Rurrenabaque in northern Bolivia. It was hot. Bloody hot and about 1000% humidity. Our bags were thrown on top of a car (without being secured) and we were taken into town to check in at the Mashaquipe office (http://www.mashaquipeecotours.com/) for our tour that would leave the next morning. We made it to our dive of a hostel 'Los Tucannes de Rurren' but considering the shower was icy cold it was worth the $10/night we paid for it. I;m sure Sarah would protest this given she was rudely awakened by a cockroach running across her body at 4am and managed to kill the big sucker with her trusty thong with out waking Kristen or I.
By 8:30am the next morning we were on our way 120km north of Rurrenabaque to the pampas near Santa Rosa. Our guide Ron was about as native as you could get. He had been born in the jungle and had spent the last two and a half years guiding pampas and jungle tours for the company Mashaquipe. It was a long dusty trip on another dirt road. We stopped about half way at a drop dunny where there were some rather large pigs who were also suffering with the heat.
Sarah got conned into riding a drunk mans horse before we were back on the road.
We finally made it to the Amazonas river for a short trip by canoe to the eco lodge and were lucky enough to spot a couple of pink dolphins within the first five minutes.
We dumped our things in the lodge, complete with bathroom frogs and mozzie nets, before a delicious three course meal. The lodge has a full time cleaner, Gladys and a chef, Wilson, who do a fabulous job in keeping the camp clean and all visitors fat. The lodge even has its own resident pet, Timo, a horrible looking possum that likes to bite and scratch people. I wasn't a fan!
We had a siesta in the hammocks before starting our first proper river cruise but there were dark clouds rolling in quickly, spots of rain and none of us had come prepared. The sky opened up and we were saturated in an unrelenting downpour. We opted out to return and dry off and wait for the shower to pass. We headed back out later in the afternoon and spotted a million caimans (Bolivian crocodiles), capyburas (giant Guinea pigs), turtles, piranhas jumping, pink Dolphins and a tree full of monkeys. That day I completely fell in love with the capyburas (I had Guinea pigs as a kid) and think I found my calling to be the first Australian capybura farmer.
We returned after dark and saw that at night with a flashlight, the caiman's eyes glow like red lasers and the banks were lined with babies. We all agreed that we all had our best nights sleep in the jungle. The rain had cooled things down and the surrounding jungle noises were like a calming sleep CD.
The next morning we set off on an Anaconda hunting expedition. We headed up the river in our gumboots and trundled into the marsh with our hiking sticks.
I was bloody petrified as there's nothing worse than a snake. I've spent my whole life avoiding them so how had I come to find myself plodding around the Bolivian pampas trying to actually find one? It soon became apparent that the place was not crawling with them and within half an hour I knew I'd be disappointed if we didn't see one. Unfortunately we didn't but Ron reckons he saw a little one.
On the way back to the lodge we did however see a green tree snake swim across the river and slither up the bank. After the mandatory siesta and seeing a rather large tree snake climbing up a tree at the lodge, we were pretty geed up for piranha fishing.
We set off to catch some dinner with a few cervazas (beers) on board. Sarah was first to reel a fish in after Kristen and I both had near misses. Unfortunately it was a baby catfish!
We decided Ron's secret spot was pretty ordinary so we move down stream where we hit the jackpot. I caught three, one was a little small that I threw back and a catfish, Kristen also caught two big ones and a catfish and Sarah caught another catfish and a small piranha.
We called it a day and set off to watch the sunset, however Sarah wasn't satisfied and was saving her final bait. Whilst we were watching the sunset a proud Sarah came back up from the boat with a proper piranha.
The chef fried up our catch of the day for dinner and we decided to try our luck at a nocturnal river cruise to try and spot the elusive jaguar. I'm pretty sure the three of us were asleep most of the time so no big cats were seen. The final day we did a long and hot river cruise to try and spot more monkeys and Jaguars. All I could think about was my burning skin and the impending heat stroke with the lack of water I had on board. I spotted a lone monkey and we managed to see two of the really big caiman that can measure up to 8m long. These animals look to be from a prehistoric time and are quite frightening to see due to their sheer size. Even Ron didn't stick around for us to get a photo as he said that they have been known to attack boats at times. We packed up our cabin, had some lunch and headed back to Rurrenabaque on the dusty road. We made good time, checked back into our dodgey hostel and hit the Luna bar for some cold coronas. Pizza for dinner and back to the cockroach dump for our last hot sweaty night.
Uyuni, Bolivia
The next day was a travel day from Rurrenabaque to La Paz and then from La Paz to Uyuni. There's not a lot going on in Uyuni. Just a lot of dust and funny street names. Our sole purpose for a trip to Uyuni was to take a one day Red Planet Expedition tour of the famous Salt flats (http://www.redplanetexpedition.com/).
We had a teeny tiny triple share (single + bunk bed) hostel room at hostel Oro Blanco with a small bathroom with a poorly placed glass panel in the door. It was basically at crutch level when you sat on the loo! We walked quite possibly every street in dusty Uyuni before a quick bite to eat and an uncomfortable nights sleep.
A late departure time for our tour meant we could have a lazy start to the day. Kristen and I sat at the buffet breakfast for a good two hours pillaging the free wi-fi before heading off to Red Planet Expeditions for our salt flats tour. We meet our guide Obed and five of us piled into a land cruiser. Our first stop was the train cemetery.
The trains that were imported from the UK a number of years ago weren't built to handle the altitude and therefore degraded rapidly in the Uyuni climate. It was like a jungle gym for grown ups with some fun photo opportunities.
Our next stop was for lunch at the small town of Colchani. The town solely revolves around the production of salt. We walked through a family owned salt factory and learnt about how it is processed for sale. The rest of our day included a number of stops across the 10,000km2 Salar de Uyuni to see the salt pyramids, the location of the Dakar car race, fish island which is covered with giant cacti and petrified coral and the 'eyes of the salt' where the water lies just underneath the salt and forms large salt crystals.
There was of course many opportunities along the way to stop and take the mandatory perspective photos which we found require a special knack.
We caught a late night flight back to La Paz which marked our final night in Bolivia. The next morning we said adios to Bolivia and headed off to Peru. Bolivia was muy bueno!
