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Published: September 13th 2006
On Saturday we took on the Death Road and we survived! (we have a T-shirt to prove it). James and I, along with Ryan Pellett (a friend from NZ), Laura (a teacher at James' school), a guide and two other travellers biked down what has been labelled the 'world's most dangerous road' from La Cumbre (4640m in the Bolivian Andes) to Yolosa (1295m). There are approximately 20-100 deaths per year (the stats vary) on this road and apparently 2 cycling accidents per year... even two weeks ago there a bus full of 50 people went over the edge resulting in a tragedy. We learnt half way down that they have named particular corners after the nationality of a few cyclists who were going to fast around certain corners.
This first part was nicely paved and two-laned... so we were able to ride (or speed bomb in super aero-dynamic position, if you were James or Ryan) down the road at a nice speed with awesome views. It was at this point that James and Ryan also took the opportunity to do bunny-hops and ride with no hands. James also decided he would be the group photographer whilst biking - much to
Julie's disapproval. We also had a patch of uphill which was a nice killer at such a high altitude and with fully suspended mountain bikes.
From there our guide pulled us over and told us to bike down the opposite side of the road (the correct side if you're from NZ) and said if we biked on the right side we would likely die. We also learnt that we had to giveway to uphill traffic (in a vehicle reversing was necessary for downhill traffic in the case of a traffic jam). At this point the road became gravel and was very narrow with massive (1000m) drop-offs... it was 'muy interesante' to look over the edge, but such a drop-off was enough to throw you off balance and put you into a panic attack... so it paid not to look too often (especially at high speed).
At a few of the blind corners there were people who held green/red signs indicating whether a vehicle was coming up the hill... at one point a man yelled 'stoppy, stoppy, STOP!!'... its not often that you hear Bolivians talking in English.... but we did heed his instructions, which saved us from being
wiped out by a (large) truck coming around the corner.... its difficult to describe exactly how tight the road is when a truck and a bus need to pass each other.
After 64km of downhill biking (and very sore hands and bottoms) we reached our destination. There were no mortalities, except as per usual Ryan injured himself with a sprained ankle (and only 500m left to go) while pulling a risk-taking venture. After finishing our bike ride we spent the night at a town a few minutes away and relaxed beside the pool - playing cards, chilling out in their hammocks, and enjoying the sun, the low altitude, the humidity and the scenery.
The ride back up the death road the next day was sobering - especially when meeting oncoming traffic and when total fog surrounded us. It's not a drive worth taking too often! Although the scenery was absolutely amazing.
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Anna-M
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Tu habla espanol perfecto ahora?
Hola chicos, LOVING the blogs, keep them coming with lots and lots of photos. Hope you are having the best time....by the looks of things you are. Love and all the best all the Subritzkys! PS have no idea if that spanish sentence is structured right...but got the words down sweet...know you two little smarties will be doing better than I did at spanish for sure!