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Published: January 12th 2010
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The world’s most dangerous road: “keep in mind, the gravel road is just that: it’s narrow (just over 3.2m wide) and has precipitous cliffs up to 600m.and there’s traffic. At time of research, eight people (higher figures sometimes quoted) have died doing the 64km trip (with a 3600m vertical drop)….” -Lonely Planet
So the whole group decided to do the Death Road descent which is a 64km cycle downhill on one of the “deadliest roads in the world”! This has become a very popular thing for backpackers to do in La Paz.
We wake up at bright and early and meet in the lobby at 6 20 am, make our way to the agency where they take us for a quick breakfast & then its gear fitting time! We put on the pants, fluorescent jackets and full face helmets and once everyone has their gear we get onto the bus. The bus ride to the top takes about an hour; at the top it’s quite windy, misty and cold! (4,600 meters above sea level!) Our guides give us some prep about the bikes and we get to try them in the field for a few minutes, then its a
few cheesy pictures and off we go!
The first 35 km of the road is all tarmac and lovely and smooth, unfortunately I didn’t enjoy that part too much as I don’t like going so fast with cars and lorries on the road, plus I wanted to do the mountain biking (anyone who knows me knows how I am with off road!) . Although I didn’t particularly enjoy the biking I did enjoy the view! Although we were at such a high altitude there were still lush green mountains soaring over us peaking through the mist, words cannot describe how beautiful it was.
We then were picked up by the bus again to do an uphill, and finally took the turning onto the real death road; here starts the fun part! We get off the bikes get our gear back on a get some more info from our guides on how to handle this road and type of terrain. And then it started we started riding down it was amazing!
Unfortunately part of the way down a girl collided with another girl and fell, she hurt herself and also broke one of her teeth; she was put in the
van and unfortunately that was the end of the bike ride for her. I felt a little in shock up by it because it’s always scary when you’re doing things like this to fall off and really hurt yourself. Luckily it was nothing serious and no one else got hurt.
The ride in itself was beautiful actually that was the most exciting part of it! We went through waterfalls and all along there were amazing butterflies and as we started going lower in altitude there was more of a rainforest fauna.
As we came to the end of the bike ride the heat started hitting us and by the time we were finished we were all looking forward for a cold drink! After having our drink and taking a few group pictures we boarded the bus and were then taken to a little hostel not far from the end of the road, there we had lunch and also could swim and refresh ourselves in the pool! That was our last stop before taking the long bus ride back to La Paz.
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Alex Schleifer
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Wow.
That looks amazing. I think in the last Top Gear I saw they do that trip. Davina and I were freaking out just watching it on TV. I wouldn't have been so relaxed knowing you were going to do this! Crazy. But looks like something I would love to do. Congrats little sis. Bisous. x