miércoles, 16 de marzo de 2011

Death Road on a bicycle- wise?

I slept through the hour and a half ride leaving from La Paz. I woke  to a car that seemed to have travelled to the Andes- snow caps, icy lakes, 4640 meters of noticeably chilly altitude. The death road connected La Paz with all of northern Bolivia where the southern tip of the amazon lies, and La Paz doesn’t sit very far north. Five years ago, the government (finally) decided to splurge for an alternative route. 26 cars on average spilled over the side of the cliff per year for lack of sleep, sobriety, or even minor lapses in attentiveness. At points, the road is 3 metres wide- and its a two lane road. Tiny memorials dot the road sides including one at a particularly precarious curve remembering martyrs who were thrown for their vocal outcries which disturbed the despotic anti-democratic governments stronghold over one of the countries many revolutions, a sign that the severity of the roads name was not lost on the Bolivians who had no other choice on the transportation of coca and coffee from the Yungas or necessities for their families in the steamy lowlands bordering Brazil. It is the only stretch of road in the country where you drive on the left, giving way to those coming on the right, so drivers can measure in millimetres tire space from the sheer drop below. The 64 kilometres of over 3000 meters of vertical descent begins in Ansel Adams mountains painted with prayers and hopes- " Jesus es la luz", "Te amo Dios". The waterfalls thaw quickly as we descended into an anti-plato sparsely covered with hearty, determined plants, but the fauns only appear where the ferns grow large enough to hide behind and leaves have evolved into advanced drainage systems. I’d say we rode through waterfalls, but I fear the image it paints in your mind. This wasn’t water crashing against rocks, but mists floating straight from above like a shower through a fine sieve, an illusion that seemed a natural atmosphere given a narrow road carved almost lengthwise cave against the stern valley wall. The group stops every twenty minutes or so to give our hands a rest from the juttering over unpaved roads and for me, the slowest, to catch up but I don’t mind after an occasional large black butterfly is framed by the stunning valley views and I can see hawks soaring from the other side of the water mists.

1 comentario:

  1. Glad you survived! Sounds like some of those drivers might have taken a lesson from our bus-driving-friends in PV. Remember - there, it only takes two deaths to remove a license! TWO!

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