La Paz

And then there was two……Kate and I are writing this after saying a sad goodbye to Soph, Shane and Anna. We have had such an incredible journey together over the past two and a half months and we´ll miss them heaps and heaps.

We´ve had some amazing experiences in the last few weeks - some of the best and worst days of our trip. We have learned that Bolivia has some of the best mountain biking in the world, La Paz has amazing shopping and fruit juice and never to let Bolivian shop owners see how much money we have!

Following our jeep trip across the salt plains we took a bus from Uyuni to La Paz. It was a bit of a shock for all of us arriving in third world Boliva. Although rich in natural resources Bolivia has been constantly exploited over the years with an unstable political history. These things combined make it one of the poorest countries in South America. The poverty is clearly evident on the streets. After almost having our teeth shaken out on the bumpy bus trip to La Paz we made our way through the chaotic streets to the Adventure Brew Hostel.

La Paz is a city of 1.5 million situated in a large basin surrounded by snow-capped peaks and crazy geographical formations. Although on first impression the city seems chaotic, crowded and dirty- the downtown area is surprisingly clean with a good buzz about it. Although the constant protests marches and dynamite going off in the streets did take a bit of getting used to! We spent our first afternoon sliding down the slippery cobble-stoned streets in a rainy season downpour and visiting Gravity Assisted Moutain Biking. Gravity is owned by a Kiwi entrepreneur Alistair. He started his business around ten years ago running guided tours down `The World`s Most Dangerous Road`. Since then his business has taken off, with the ride becoming one of the main tourist attractions in La Paz.
The next day we set off with Gravity for some single-track riding just outside of La Paz. We had an awesome day riding on our hired full-suspension bikes with Scottish guide Matt and Bolivian Gus. We climbed to over 5000m and descended through a mixture of smooth rolling single-track, rock gardens, local villages and crazy steep switch backs (a bit beyond my riding ability!) Shane was in absolute heaven and our guides were pretty impressed with his riding skills pulling off some mean drop-offs and jumps. During the day we talked to Matt about how keen we were to ride an Inca trail called the Taquesi. Shane had heard about it from some mates back home who rated it as one of the best rides of their lives. It is not usually run as a tour by Gravity….but Matt was keen as to ride it and thought he could sweet talk the boss (Alistair) round. Whatever he said worked and the next thing we knew we were arranging our trip down 45km of old Inca trail in the middle of the Bolivian mountains.
After a day of rest and recovery we set off at 4:30am in the Gravity jeep. As we climbed out of La Paz I did some back seat medical consultations with our guides- dishing out pills to halt their diarrhoea. We picked up a local miner on the way- doggedly pushing his bike up the steep hill so he could coast home at the end of his long hard day in the dark cold mines. Our ride started in freezing temperatures in the middle of a snow-storm! The first hour was spent pushing our heavy bikes up a rocky slippery track in the snow….but from there it was pretty much all down, down, down! The riding was incredible- broken up trails with large rocks, steps and drop-offs, streams, slippery paved sections, sweet single-track and a tricky river crossing to top off an magic day. The weather improved as we descended and we had spectacular views of the surrounding mountains, valleys and rivers. We were all stoked with our Gravity bikes and were amazed with what we could ride on our full-sus bikes.

After a few well earned beers we started the long drive home through a breath-taking valley, quite different to anywhere any of us had been before. For dinner that night we had our first experience of the delicious local specialty- trucha (trout)…..and it had never tasted so good!! Thanks so much to Alistair and the Gravity staff for making our Taquesi day happen.

Exhausted from our long ride we chilled out in La Paz buying presents for our families and planning the next leg of our journey. Planning touring routes in Bolivia is a little more challenging than down south. Getting our hands on descent maps was tricky in itself….then knowing how much to believe is another story. After gathering as much information as possible we set off out of La Paz hoping to do a three or four day loop. Getting out of La Paz was a mission in itself….the crowded streets, erratic drivers and packed markets made pushing, let alone riding our bikes hard work. For the first time on the trip I had absolutely no energy in my legs and Sophie and Shane were cracking up when they watched Anna, Kate and I cruise by on a bus on the climb out of the city to La Cumbre! At la Cumbre we had our first views of the famed `World`s Most Dangerous Road`. The road´s reputation stems from the average 100 deaths on it each year. Although parts of the road are in pretty poor condition, it is terrible driving that accounts for most of the fatalities. The first section of the road is sealed and we tore through the cold air towards trucha for dinner! We camped part way down the road- all stoked to be out of the city and back in our tents! The following day we set off early- looking forward to the narrow gravel part of the descent and witnessing Anna`s dare for Kate…..a naked ride around `postcard`corner! The riding was not particularly dangerous, but you definitely wouldn´t want your brakes to fail, resulting in a very very long drop over the sheer cliffs the road is cut into. Kate pulled off her dare with no worries….in fact I think she prefers riding naked!

As we dropped in altitude the air became warm and sticky with the vegetation becoming more and more jungle-like, with mango trees and brightly coloured butterflies everywhere. The most challenging part of our ride was crossing a large active land-slide with rocks and rubble tumbling down. In the hot jungle air we climbed a steep 7km to the town of Coroico.

That afternoon we rode out of Coroico along narrow, but well formed dirt roads. Bolivians seem to live everywhere, and we passed through village after village. The countryside is so steep and every piece of land is cultivated- no matter what the terrain. This made it a bit difficult finding a camping spot at the end of the day. Just as we settled on a lumpy, smelly road side spot a huge thunder storm erupted over head. It was seriously the loudest thunder any of us had every heard, and Sophie stood laughing hysterically as the rest of us ran around not knowing what to do with ourselves! The storm passed quickly and we set up camp.

The following day will not be remembered as our favourite…..but at least we could all laugh about by the end of the trip! We rode in the humid tropical air toward the town of Coripata. Soph arrived first and headed into a shop to buy us some lunch supplies. The shop-owner assured her he had change for her 100 boliviani note then preceeded to deny she ever handed it to him (blatantly stealing it!). By the time I arrived they were in a heated discussion in broken Spanish. Unfortunately the locals had seen how much money we had and decided to completely rip us off. We all attempted to get our point across, but to no avail. Angry and frustrated, one of the group (I`m sure many of you can guess who!) decided to take the law into her own hands by throwing a big bag of oats over the shop floor and owner. What eventuated was a near street brawl with buckets of water being thrown, broomsticks flying around, us being man-handled, Sophie´s pannier being taken and eventually the police arriving on the scene. Having attracted the attention of half the town we eventually escaped from the horrible scene with all our gear, no lunch and 125 bolivianis less. After finally finding the road out of town Sophie calmed herself with a beer on the bike while I vented my anger at a certain oat-throwing person! After a subdued lunch we all had a good chat/debrief…and as I said we can laugh about it now! This is definitely not the norm for Bolivian behaviour, but there are pockets of animosity toward `gringos`, and we have been a lot more wary following this incident. That afternoon we rode into a valley that joined back up with the dangerous road. Once again it was not easy finding somewhere to camp with the road cut into the steep slope. We eventually found a random hotel and camping spot with semi-hot showers. The following day Shane and Soph rode all the way back to La Paz, climbing over 3000m (crazy!!), while we opted for a slightly easier 1700m climb and then bus into the city. We rewarded ourselves with a delicious Indian dinner!

Following our ride into rural Bolivia we took a more touristy trip to Lake Titicaca and Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun). The trip involved lots of shopping, eating and a terrifying/hilarious trip in a bus on a precarious wooden barge across the lake. Shane and Soph were smart enough and fast enough to hop of the bus and take the safer ferry, while the rest of us were still gathering our gear our bus was moving and swaying across the water! We stayed in the lakeside town of Copacabana where Anna went nuts buying alpaca products- her favourite and a definite must for all adventure racing world champions- alpaca leg-warmers!

We did a loop of the Isla del Sol riding mostly on old inca trails, dodging locals with their donkeys, llamas and sheep. We had great views over lake Titicaca and the nearby Cordillera Real. Our trip as a group of five was topped off by a fantastic last day riding with the Gravity crew. The team invited us to join them on a staff trip to ride the `Jungle Rail-trail`. It was cool meeting and riding with Phil and KJ -two Kiwis who have recently started working for Gravity. This is a fantastic non-technical 65km ride on 4WD track and single-track. We had an absolutely brilliant day riding thanks to the Gravity crew. Our ride was followed by much needed hot showers and dinner at a wild-life sanctuary before a very boozy bus-ride back to La Paz.

The last few days have been a bit dampened by Kate´s worsening tummy troubles. She has been sick on and off for a couple of weeks but things have deteriorated in the last few days (power-chucking in the streets of La Paz!!) We have started antibiotics and hope things settle soon. We´re planning a chilled out couple of days in Sorata to recuperate.

To our beavers…..thank you for such an awesome trip. It has been such an amazing experience journeying through South America with you all. Thank you Shane for all the fix-it jobs and putting up with us four chicas. Thanks Soph for towing us in the headwinds and always being so super organised. And Pari….well thanks for being you- you´re special alright! We´ll miss you all so much….it has truly been the trip of a life-time!! Ciao perros!!!

Atacama desert and Uyuni

Sweltering in the driest desert in the world, waking in frozen tents, climbing to over 4550m on our bikes, driving across the salt plains of Bolivia, and watching flamingos in the early morning sun.....it has been a busy week!!
After we left you last we had a marathon 36 hour bus trip from Pucon through to Santiago (the capital of Chile) all the way to San Pedro- a small town in the Atacama Desert (northern Chile). The first leg of our trip was an overnight bus, and although none of us slept much, it wasn´t too bad. On reaching Santiago we delayed the whole bus for over an hour as we entered into a fiery debate with the the bus drivers and managers about whether or not our bikes and gear would fit under the bus. Thanks to some strong persuasion from Sophie we were finally allowed five minutes to try packing our gear ourselves. Experts by now, it took us less that two minutes to pack our five bike frames, twelve wheels, two Bob trailers and eight panniers safely in the luggage compartment. Unfortunately as the drivers had refused to listen to us and our bikes were packed last and we had to watch on helplessly at each stop as our bikes were man-handled in and out of the bus by the drivers bearing bruised egos!

From lush green beech forests to rainless expanses and cactuses- the land north of Santiago was in stark contrast to southern Chile. We were all relieved not to be riding the 2000 plus kms of desolate coast raod, with little water and unchanging landscape.

We were all stoked to arrive in San Pedro and relieved to find our bikes all still in working order. San Pedro is a cute little town at 2400m set in the heart of the Atacama desert (the driest in the world). The town has small mud buildings, narrow streets and lots of bikes. Unaclimatised to the desert heat we were happy to find a swimming pool at our camp ground. We cooled off and then headed out for a bike ride to a salt laguna 30km out of town (Laguna Cejas), which is similar to the Dead Sea. It was a crazy sensation floating as buoyant as if we were wearing life jackets, with a back-drop of volcanoes and desert. Kate attempted diving under head first but could hardly get her feet submerged, and came up with very sore eyes. Afterwards our bodies were caked with salt and it stung to move and put on our clothes. Matilda had her first puncture on the way back to camp- but Shane managed to dub her and push her bike at the same time!

The next morning we set off early with a local mountain bike guide we had met on the bus - between his limited english and our limited spanish we managed to arrange for him to show us some of the local riding for free. Slightly intimidated by his extreme training regime at altitude and his mean physique we were all excited to be going proper mountain bike riding with no panniers or Bobs!

We rode through some stunning landscapes- the valley of death, crazy rock formations, sand dunes, tricky rocky descents and bit of pushing through thick sand. The morning was topped off with some Inca ruins and un-lit clambering through ancient cave systems. An eager dog had joined us earlier in the morning and followed us the whole time mountain biking. We were parked beside a water resevoir with steep sides and the dog accidently fell in, he was trapped and couldn´t get out. Luckily Anna came to the rescue, we lowered her down by her feet and she plucked the panicked dog to safety. That afternoon we did jobs around town and prepared for our 3 day jeep trip in Bolivia (we had done some tough negotiating with the jeep company to carry our 5 bikes on the roof of the jeep!) We went out that night and ate well, realising it could be our last good feast for some time (Bolivia is not known for its cuisine!!)

The next day was probably our toughest day riding so far.....only 50 km but a continuous climb of over 2200m to a maximum altitude of 4600m. We set off early hoping to avoid the worst of the desert heat, but Shane still managed to sweat several litres. We all found the altitude pretty taxing (shortness of breath, nausea, lethargy and headaches) and we made slow progress with frequent stops for dry wretching and lots of water.

The altitude took its toll....

After a total of 6.45 hours riding we were delighted to reach the pass and absolutely buzzing on the 5km descent to the Bolivian border post. The scenery was amazing as we entered Bolivia... mountains of every colour, 6000m volcanoes and vast stretches of barren land. We got our passports stamped and set up camp a few kms down the road behind some large rocks (trying to escape from the now bitterly cold wind). All exhausted and cold but happy, we cooked our usual tomato pasta meal for dinner and climbed into our tents for a very early night! Unfortunately none of us slept much that night (possibly altitude?) and we awoke to a temperature of -6 degrees and our tents covered in ice. We packed up and rode the last 5km to meet our jeep for the tour. That morning we meet a couple of small children who live in this very remote part of Bolivia. They were fascinated by our bikes and Shane spent half an hour towing them around in his Bob trailer!! We were then met by our jeep and other passengers. They had been told to expect five Polish girls on bikes- so were a bit disappointed to meet four smelly Kiwi chicas and one bearded boy!

We spent the next three days getting driven through southwest Bolivia in a Toyota Landcruiser, passing through some of the most spectacular landscapes on Earth - different coloured lagoons, geysers, crazy rock formations, volcanoes, islands covered in cacti and the huge Uyuni salt plain. Our jeep was pretty comfortable, we were joined by a German girl called Irena and our driver Danielo. We gradually adjusted to the altitude- although it provided it provided a multitude of excuses for various things- including Shane getting boozed on only three beers! The salar provided a great oppurtunity to take crazy perspective photos.....And our favourite....Following the trip we drove into our first Bolivian town Uunyi. The poverty and dirt strewn streets came as a bit of a shock to us- but we ended up having a nice evening enjoying the sun and pizza with other travellers. Next stop La Paz...Bolivia´s capital where we hope to do some good riding before the other three have to head back to New Zealand and we continue our journey through South America.

Happy new year!!!

We last left you on Christmas morning and have now ridden over 2400km! We had a really cool xmas day with good weather, a run and a swim. In the evening we cooked up a feast- roast chicken with stuffing and gravy, lots of veges, salad, wine, bread and a delicious apple crumble for dessert. The following day we headed north from Coyhaique. Our riding since Christmas has been great, some beautiful valleys, lakes, glaciers and fiords. We experienced the rain of the Carretera Austral- making it pretty cold at times, especially on the descents. They have similar rainfall levels as Fiordland in NZ - mucho!!!!
Camp-sites at night had to meet the criteria of flat, sheltered, and access to water- camping beneath a bridge is perfect!! The road itself is in the process of being paved. Progress is a bit chaotic with the surface in various stages of mess. At times it was unrideable and we had to push, but never for too long. Sophie had a record 5 crashes in one afternoon and lost a bit of skin, but stitches weren´t required. One day stood out in particular- we ascended through dense rain forest with trees nearly meeting over head along a narrow section of road. The descent opened out onto a spectacular valley leading to a hanging glacier. We then spent the afternoon soaking in natural hot springs at a flash resort. The owner looked a bit disapproving of the dirty cycle tourists standing in her foyer and politely asked us to leave our panniers outside! We camped close by at the head of the fiord with dolphins feeding in the bay (no lies!)

The next day we rode a solid 90km and camped on a farmer´s property next to a beautiful river- perfect for swimming, washing and reading by a camp fire. The rain finally cleared and we have had five days of sunshine since... Long may it last!!!!We turned off the Carreteral Austral at Villa Santa Lucia, heading back toward Argentina. We found a dreamy lake-side beach- perfect for swimming and chilling out. Nice to have some hot weather and dry everything out...The next day was New Years Eve and we made the short but tough ride into Futaleufu. This small town is located near the world renowned Futaleufu River- one of the top kayaking and rafting spots in the world. We found a deserted camping ground covered in a fine layer of dust that later turned out to be volcanic ash! The ash had blown from the recent eruption of the Chaiten Volcano nearby. The initial eruption occurred in mid 2008 leaving the town of Chaiten virtually uninhabitable. It has continued to erupt and Chaiten is like a ghost town.

We had a fantastic New Years Eve. The evening kicked off with drinks amongst the ash at our campground. By 10pm the rest of the group managed to convince Kate that a mullet would look great on her, and isn´t it a perfect time in her life to have one...travelling, no job etc.. Next thing the scissors were out and 2/3 of her hair was gone. It looks great but hopefully grows out fast! Shane also had a new years haircut - but his is a bit more styley...looks more like Dan Carter´s rather than an 80´s rock star! The rest of the night was spent partyting with some local raft-guides. I think they were pretty shocked by the loud intoxicated Kiwis, but were stoked to get us up on the dance floor. Shane had a bit of crook guts- but pulled through and even managed to bust out a few dance moves.

On New Years Day we decided to raft the famous Futaleufu......It was awesome!! Spot the mullet!The raft guides cooked us a nice dinner at their lodge while we relaxed in the hammocks outside, it was nice hanging out with some different people our age.

On the 2nd, we crossed back into Argentina and biked to a town called Esquel. From there we caught a bus to Bariloche to avoid the busy road. Bariloche is the biggest town we have been in...100,000 people. A bit overwhelming. Hopefully getting a few repairs done here and stock up on supplies. We´re leaving tomorrow and cycling through the lakes district and back into Chile...

Feliz nuevo ano everyone. Happy 2009!

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