The Death Road -- Bolivia

So there we were, helmets on, hearts pounding, bikes hopefully in tack, mountains, glaciers and rivers surrounding our mob of 10 riders. Down we went, single file. We were actually on the main paved road for about 2 hours, vans and trucks bonking and zooming inches away from out shaky petals. My frozen hands could barley hold onto the handle bars. Some of the most beautiful country side; crisp air to the face, llamas and sheep feasting on half frozen grass behind old stone walls as we flew by. Once we arrived to the actual Death Road, the ungodly, nightmarish road became clear through the high mountain fog. Across the valley the tan wire-thin road hugged tightly to the lush, jungle mountain side like a baby to its mother in a vicious storm. Everyone took there “last pictures”, thinking it might be the last time they’d be alive (9 French tourists just died on the road last week, and 100 people die on it every year – just for future reference). We started slowly, quite slowly, down the loose gravely road, joking with one another to alleviate the fear of death out of our quivering minds. And once the first edge came unbelievably looming around the corner like an angry elephant in heat, everyone was pretty much at a stand still. The dirt road, no wider than a VW Bug, ended quite -- let’s say – sharply to a sheer vertical 1,000+ ft cliff. Every once in a while I’d bike a little closer to the edge to get a better look at how close dying could be, I’d see old rusted, mangled busses and cars crashed and batter in the jungle below, and I’d quickly merge back to hugging the wall. At one point some (damn) Canadian kid started getting all cocky and passed me on the shoulder, seconds later just a few yards in front of me his shirt, which he stupidly tied around his handle bars, got caught in his front spokes, the wheel locked up and over he went head first like a retarded pole vaulter, the bike landing smack dab on top of him. He skidded roughly along the sharp gravel and ended up about 3 feet from the bloodcurdling edge. Another fellow from another group actually flew right off the damn cliff, only to be miraculously saved by a wee tree 30 feet down; he eventually got pulled up by a rope with a face battered and bloody. After 5 hours of a nerve-racking, body-vibrating, wild ride, we made it to the bottom to a warm, lush jungle setting. As scary as it was, the adrenalin and rush of the whole adventure was well worth it – and I even got a t-shirt that says I survived “The World’s Most Dangerous Road”.

The next day we took a 3 day jungle tour up a river into this national park. I spent most of the time growling at the crocodiles, laughing at the funny monkeys jumping on my head, petting strange pink river dolphins, comparing teeth with piranhas, and making inappropriate jokes with the anaconda we found – come on, when you’re with a bunch of rowdy boys that stuff just slips out. (The snake actually bit my friend, he was bleeding all over the place, I guess he deserved it, quite funny at the time though). In the jeep ride back to the little town we almost flipped right over, it started fish-tailing in the mud, swinging side to side, ended up on two wheels at one point; but the most ironically, hysterical part of it was that we were all in the middle of playing this game where you each have to sing a song that has the word LOVE in it. That would be one for the headlines: JEEP FULL OF GRINGOS DIE SINGING LOVE SONGS. Anyway, now after a 20 hour grueling, cold, wet (there was a leak in the roof which happened to be right over my head) bus ride I’m back in La Paz. Where to after here I’m not sure, but I have tentative plans of going to this animal rehab refuge park to volunteer for a while.


p.s. I actually have some pictures of the Death Road that I'll post in a few days. And I changed the comment thing so that now anyone can comment, not just "google" people, but just say who you are in the comment.

Machu Picchu

Cusco has a strange feeling, beautiful yet strange nevertheless. This colonial city was once the capital of the entire Inca Empire, and now millions of cheesy tourist from around the globe flood into its red-cob colored city to see Machu Picchu, selling hikes and tours like they’re newspapers on the streets of New York. A brief stroll through the main plaza will bombard you with everything from alpaca socks, cocaine, to Machu Picchu treks. People will come running out of nowhere, shoving lunch menus in your face, and tell you its happy hour. I guess it’s always happy hour because they always say that just to get you to come in their restaurant. One evening I went out to dinner with a large group of people, sat down in the fancy air, and we all ordered the local specialty – guinea pig (sorry Debby). His burnt paws were crisped and out stretched on the plain white plate; as I bit into its little body I couldn’t extinguish the sound of our old guinea pig making its cute little squeaks whenever you walked by his little home in the sunroom. The little guy didn’t even taste that good, but I gave him (or her) and all the other guinea pigs in the world a short little prayer of thanks and forgiveness.

On my birthday I started a 5 day / 4 night trek with 10 other people around the mountain of Salkantay reaching 13,500 ft and then into Machu Picchu. By far one of the most amazing (and strenuous) things I have ever done in my entire life. The first night in the tents we got snowed on, bundled in every article of clothing I had, huddled in my sleeping bag I smiled to the first day of being 24. We hiked along a pristine gorge, the river grumbled way down at the bottom of the valley. Every hour or so I’d have to just stop and look back at the breath-taking lower Andes sprawling on forever, up ahead the looming coke-white peak of Salkantay mountain beckoned our way. For 6 hours I sucked on a huge wad of coca leaves for energy and to help with the ever escalating elevation, and talked with all the exciting new people I was about to spend the next 5 days with in the wild of the Andes Mountains. That cold night everyone sang me happy birthday, mumbling when it came time to say the name because nobody really remembered it yet, the tour guide bought me a small pint of rum and the cooks surprised me with a cake they make from scratch. The second day we woke up before dawn, our guide served us steaming hot coca tea in our tents before we even go out of our sleeping bags, the hot cup was like a savior to my fingers, white and trembling from the below freezing temperature. This second day was the hardest, but most beautiful. We hiked for a total of 9 hours, 5 up to the base of Salkantay, and then 4 hours of a knee killing decent down into the jungle. The picturesque landscape changed drastically every hour, and every hour my knee felt more and more like it was broken. At the end of the day I was hobbling down the trail like a drunken pirate and flopped down on the grass at camp. Imagine walking through a National Geographic magazine article about the Andes Mountain and Machu Picchu, and then times it by 1000, and that’s pretty much what the trek was like. The next several day were slightly easier, lower elevation and warmer environment, and a well deserved stop at the most spectacular hot springs I’ve ever seem. I took hundreds of mental hand-camera shots; it’s pretty fun to make a circle of your hand and make shutter sounds while everyone around you is snapping away with their fancy-pants cameras, (and just for the record, 3 people’s camera broke during the trip, especially after the third day when its down poured all night and inside everyone’s tents looked like a miniature Lake Titicaca). Machu Picchu was cold, rainy and foggy when we arrived at 6am; our tour guide (just for MP, not the one we had during our whole trek) had the worst English ever and sounded like a drowning guinea pig after being barbequed on Super Bowl Sunday. The only thing I learned (or heard) was that the Inca people held the most respect for the sun; well shit, what else were they supposed to think of that huge, bright, christless, orange thing moving through the sky every day. I didn’t need the guide anyway, the mystical energy and deep power of the place was enough of a guide for me. I’m just blown away by the difference of this ancient culture building a marvelous city teetering on top of 1000ft sheer vertical cliffs, and the present times of our hummer humping, plastic dumping society.

Anyway, I left Cusco and headed for Lake Titicaca on the boarder of Peru and Bolivia(the highest navigable lake in the world). Took a 3 hour boat ride out to this island in the middle of the lake and spent the night in this local lady’s house, the name (Titicaca) itself was well worth the trip. My new friends and I walked about the peaceful, car-less island; the calm blue lake was laking on for miles where it laid asleep in the lap of far away bleach white mountains.


p.s. Feel free to make comments or say hi if you reads this so I know I'm not writting to the wind.

Peru

We didn’t know what we were doing, that seems like the normal status quo these days; its actually a fun game called ¨I have no idea what’s going on, but I think I like it¨. If you ever get a chance to play you should. So out we went, Me, Mex from Holland and this German dude, to meet these local Peruvian guys for a few drinks. As we wandered through the devastated town on Pisco, everything in rubble from the huge earthquake last August. The town looks like some Eastern European town after the World War. The few buildings that are still standing are bars, restaurants or hostels. Inside this fancy wine bar we ordered the local drink called a Pisco Sour, which is sort of like a strange margarita but with raw egg (it’s a wonder we didn’t get salmonella). These guys told us all about the town and their families and friends that died in the quake, quite sad actually. I noticed my Spanish was getting better and could understand more, but then I figured it may have been from all the Pisco Sours I’d been drinking. So the game continued, off we went to some discotech in the out skirts of town, full of people, 200 or so, and we were the only gringos. Everyone gave us the classic ¨look at the freaky gringo¨ look, but that’s all just part of the game. We danced the night away to out dated American hip-hop and cheesy Spanish songs. Before we knew it it was 2:30am, our boat tour out to the Islas Ballestas (The Poor Man’s Galapagos) leaves at 7:00am. Back to the hostel for 3 hours of sleep and out to the islands. Still sort of drunk, we motored out in a large speed boat with 12 other tourists. It was absolutely amazing, thousands upon thousands of birds covered these small desolate islands, penguins waddled about like confused business men at a vegan pot-luck and sea lions moved about in awkward dances while their babies barked and played in the surf. Truly magnificent, well worth the 10 dollars. The same day Mex and I hoped on a bus to Haucachina, a cute little oasis town in the middle of huge, sprawling sand dunes rolling on forever. For a dollar we rented sand boards with straps and up we went, trekking through the heavy sand sinking below out feet. And believe me, trying to hike up a 600 ft sand dune is no easy task my friend. So there we were sitting at the top of this massive sand mountain, over looking the cute oasis and miles of sweeping smooth sand dudes as far as the eye could see, and the game continues. ¨Go Mex, I’ll watch you first¨ I sarcastically said. ¨Hell no man, you’re the surfer, you go¨ he replied in his funny Dutch accent. Once again, we had no idea what we were doing but we thought it may be fun. Down we went like old ladies standing in a small canoe. There isn’t really any turning involved so you pretty much have to just bomb down the thing in a straight line but then you get going way too fast and the only way to stop is wipe-out. And that we did, many a time. OH shit there we were cart wheeling down the hill, sand swirling and flying ever which way, covering our bodies and filling out ears and eyes, gritting between out teeth laughing all the way. Later on we decided to go for a dune buggy ride; the driver flung us town gigantic mountains of sand and jumped off ledges and banks. A wild ride to say the least. I’m sure I’ll be cleaning sand out from every crevasse for the next week. We’re heading to Cusco tonight, a 15 hour drive through the mountains. Cusco is the base town where everybody stays before hiking to Machu Picchu. So on we go...