Worlds Most Dangerous Road

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Kai was very excited today because it was the day we had booked in to do the Worlds Most Dangerous Road (WMDR). The WMDR got its name from its horrific past in which on average just under 200 people a year died on the road, untill in the 90's a main highway was finished which was used instead of WMDR. This road is about the size of a fire trail but with a vertical drop of up to 1000 meters in some parts. We headed off early, at around 7ish to meet the bus and head of to our starting point. Ahead of us was a 4000 metre decent over 63kms.

The first 32km of the ride was on tar road so we could get used to our bikes & also some real speed up, well Kai and a few others did. You often would be going faster than the cars, however overtaking them was a little dangerous as often you couldn't see around the corners. This first section was a nice stretch of road, down hill, windy section that required little breaking. We finally stopped at a little town about 8 kilometres before the start of the dirt track were you have to pay the entrance fee for the road. All of us, but Kai and another guy, packed our bikes onto the roof of the bus and got on for the up hill section of the ride. This section was quite tough at this altitude, you were just trying to get oxygen to your muscles but you couldn't breath in enough. We all regrouped at the start of the dirt section where we began riding on whats known as The World Most Dangerous Road.

On this section of the road, which is barely two car widths wide with shear 1000 meter drops on the side, the road rules are switched around and you drive on the opposite side (left side of the road). You do this because the drop is on your left side and the driver can stick his head out of the car to see the edge of the road. The ride was rocky, with some sharp turns in it, our guides stopped every now and then describing what was coming up. These guys knew every corner pretty much, "you go through a few off camber corner then take a sharp right than a left through a creek and then up a slight rise......", just amazing how well they know it.

The ride wasn't without it's events just after Kai had ridden through one of the many water falls on the ride, relatively slowly his front wheel hit a rock & threw him over the handle bars. People that saw it said it looked like he just did a big commando roll and landed on his feet, he wasn't really hurt just his pride. Although he may have survived the camera which was in his shorts pocket did nlot. He had been taking photo's along the ride, & it took most of the damage on the fall we think because it had a smashed screen. So not too many more photo's from the ride. Only that from the guides who had been taking photo's all the way down.

Once at the bottom we headed off to a nature reserve for our lunch. Here he had to cross a mini river rapid over a broken bridge. Half of us were across all fine, until Kai tried. He dropped nearly every thing out of the bag and into the river, including the camera. Without hesitating he jumped in and collected most of it back, drench to the waste.
On the drive back up the hill it felt even more scary than riding down. Some of the blind corners were every scary specially at the speeds everyone in driving up and down. We were there sitting in the our bus, watching two buses trying to get past, siading to ourselves they are not going to make, yet the squeeze past after pulling in their mirror, but than its our turn. The only thing that was comforting for us was that had the hill on our side. But we all made it back to La Paz safely although it was everyone was drained.

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