Where's Andrew

LA PAZ, BOLIVIA - NOVEMBER 12 - 23

I'm on a bus heading from Copacabana to La Paz by 9:00AM. The bus is supposed to be only 4 hours so I should arrive at a good time. I also had an email from Rachel and Itamar and know where they are staying and I'll try and get a room at the same hotel. I'm surprised when within an hour my bus stops at a small ferry crossing. It turns out that this part of Bolivia is not connected to the rest of the country by land. It is surrounded by Lake Titicaca to the south and Peru to the north. The ferry that my bus is going onto is tiny, it is basically a small wooden barge barely longer than the bus with a small outboard engine powering it. I can't help but think that the bus must be very near the maximum load that the ferry can handle, I'm glad that the crossing is only about a kilometer. I'm excited about going to La Paz, it has been a key point in my travel plans from the start. La Paz is the world's highest capital city at over 3500m. It is located out of the wind in a steep valley just below a mountain plain. Is was founded by the Spanish in the 1600s because of its proximity to large silver deposits and more importantly, it has the highest elevation 18 hole golf course in the world.

Plaza de San Francisco

The bus arrives in La Paz about 1:30PM as the traffic in the city of El Alto above La Paz is brutal. El Alto is one of the newest cities in Bolivia. It was started around 20 years ago when rural Bolivians started to move to the capitol of La Paz. The cost of living in the valley where La Paz is situated was too expensive for these new arrivals so a shanty town quickly grew on the flat plains just above the city. In just over 20 years, this shanty town has become the 2nd biggest city in Bolivia at just over 1 million people and has relegated La Paz to the 3rd largest city at just under 1 million people. The way El Alto grew was not based on any kind of real city planning and a market springs up every morning on the busiest avenue in the city making a bad traffic problem even worse especially because all traffic coming to or leaving from La Paz has to go right through El Alto. It also seems that almost every structure, building and home in El Alto is a partially built structure. Some look to have floors fully built with a pending addition above and some look like they just never have been finished. There are also thousands of shanty houses everywhere.

I head to the hotel where Rachel and Itamar are staying but unfortunately, they don't have any rooms available. Just as I am leaving the hotel, I run into Arnon who I met while trekking the Santa Cruz Trail near Huaraz and then I see Sagi and Bar. They are all staying at the hotel I just tried. Arnon is kind enough to let me put my bags in his room and then he and I go check out some hostels. After going to 5 or 6 different places, I finally settle on a room in the Maya Hostel right across the street from Arnon's hotel for $12US a night. Arnon is meeting Rachel and Itamar for lunch so we head over to an Israeli restaurant and Shane and Seleka are there with Rachel and Itamar.

Remains of Pyramid at Tiwanaku

Shane, Seleka, Rachel and Itamar have all been shopping for camping gear (sleeping bag, tent, sleeping matt and camp stove) to use in Patagonia. They have heard most people do treks on their own without a guide or mules. I had not considered this and start wondering if I need to buy this stuff as well. After lunch, Arnon, Rachel and Itamar are heading to some outdoor\camping stores so I decide to join them. Arnon is heading back to Israel in a few days but he is looking to bring back some gifts for his family and the price of camping gear is much cheaper here than in Israel. I price out a sleeping bag, tent and sleeping matt which after negotiating will cost almost $300US. I start to wonder what I would do with this stuff if I buy it. First, I've got to carry it around as I travel and I already have enough stuff. Second, I need to carry it with me while trekking and I don't have a trekking type backpack that would fit this stuff, I only have my day pack. My big backpack that I have my clothes in is not waterproof or suitable for trekking plus it's huge. So, I decide not to buy anything and I will decide what I need before leaving La Paz.

Arnon, Rachel, Itamar and I decide to go on a tour to the ruins of Tiwanaku which are a couple hours drive north of La Paz. We sign up for a tour at a local company for about $10 each which includes transportation to and from the ruins and a guide. We will be picked up by the tour company van at 8:30AM tomorrow morning. Shane and Seleka have plans to do the Death Road bike ride tomorrow and I'm interested in hearing what they think of it. And on the following day, Arnon, Shane and I are going to play the La Paz Golf Club and Itamar might join us as well even though he has never played golf.

The next morning, Arnon, Rachel, Itamar and I are waiting for our tour van. By 9:00AM we are wondering where it is so we call the tour company. Apparently, the tour van has broken down so we can't go with them and now it is too late to book another tour for today. So we decide to find our own transportation there and back and book a guide on site. We walk down to the Plaza de San Francisco where we catch a small van to the Cemetery District where we catch another small van to the ruins. There are 2 Portuguese couples in the van with us and together we hire an English speaking guide to tour us around the ruins for 2 hours including a couple of not very good museums. These ruins are from a pre-Inca culture that lasted almost 2500 years. I'm sure I would have enjoyed the tour if I had done it before seeing all the Inca ruins in southern Peru, but compared to the Inca ruins, this ruin was not that impressive. Doing this tour on our own also ended up costing more money than the original complete tour that we were supposed to do and took longer as well.

La Paz Golf Club

The next morning, I meet Arnon and Itamar at their hotel. Shane is not able to play golf today as he tweaked his back while bike riding yesterday. Rachel has decided to come with us as a spectator and our photographer. We catch a bus from the Plaza de San Francisco to the course which is located about 30 minutes south of the city next to the Valley of the Moon at an altitude of 3350m making it the highest 18 hole golf course in the world. Itamar is not sure if he will play or not but will join Arnon and I at the range hitting balls and will decide based on how he does. Green fees, club rentals, caddie fees, golf balls and range balls cost me about $80US. While warming up at the range, I'm hitting my

driver and 5-wood great but I don't hit even one really good iron shot which is not a good sign. My excuse is I haven't played since last year's golf trip with the guys in September and every club in my bag is a different type with different grips and shafts. Of course Itamar finds hitting a golf ball much more difficult than he expected and decides not to play but he and Rachel will walk the front nine with us.

This year, 2012, is actually the 100 year anniversary for the course and most holes are lined with large mature trees on either side. The front 9 is nice but nothing special. I'm driving the ball well but

I don't hit one good iron shot on the entire first 9 holes and shoot an awful 56. Arnon is playing about the same, maybe a stroke or 2 better and Itamar even plays a couple of holes for fun. It's hard to say how much farther the ball is going at this altitude because I'm so inconsistent with everything but my tee shots. The driver I am playing with is about a 15 year old Calloway Big Bertha and I'm consistently hitting it about 280 yards even though it is cold and wet today with some rain showers. I wish I had my oversized Deep Red driver so I could see just how far I can hit a drive at 3350m altitude.

Arnon decides to pack it in after 9 and catches a cab back to the city with Itamar and Rachel but I want to play the back nine so I continue playing. On the 10th hole, I sink about a 15m long putt for bogey and then on the next hole, I hit my first solid iron shot to the back of the green on a par 3. Suddenly, I'm hitting lots of solid iron shots. On the next par 3, it is an uphill into the wind 230 yard hole and I hit a 5-wood about 30 yards too far into a canyon behind the hole. On another hole, I hit a 9 iron well over a green that is 145 yards away up a hill, now I'm starting to see how far the ball goes at the altitude. I'm needing to club down about 2 clubs from normal, I bet when it's hot and dry in a few

months that the ball goes even farther. The back nine has a real nice layout that winds through and around the Valley of the Moon (which was named because of the wild rock formations that someone thought looked like the Lunar Moonscape). I end up shooting a 47 on the back and if it wasn't for some terrible chipping, it should have been a few strokes lower. Overall, I really enjoyed the course and the golf. It would be fun to play here a few more times to try to figure out club selection at this altitude, today it was real guess work. My Spanish speaking caddie was not much help, he seemed unable to even give me accurate yardage let alone any advice on club selection.

After golf, I catch a city bus back to the Plaza de San Francisco. As I am walking back to my hotel, I run into Sagi. He and Bar are heading for the jungle and he has found a river tour that will take them there instead of an 18 hour bus ride or a $300US flight. He tells me to meet him at his hotel in an hour and he will give me the details but if I want to go I need to sign up for the tour tonight as it is supposed to leave in the morning. The timing is not perfect as I need to go to the Brazilian Embassy and apply for a tourist visa. Well I guess I can do this when I'm back from the jungle.

Later as I wait for Sagi in the hotel lobby, I see

Itamar and Rachel. They had also wanted to go to the jungle but Rachel just found out that there is a problem with her graduation from University because it seems she is 1.5 credits short on her degree. Before she and Itamar are going to leave La Paz, she needs to find out what she has to do to get her degree which will probably include signing up for another course this February and it will likely take a few days before she is able to figure out her options. When Sagi and Bar get back to the hotel, they are now not sure if the tour is happening. The guide will only go if there are at least 6 people confirmed. There was supposed to be 8 people other than me but 4 of them had not yet paid their deposit and it is now 6:30PM. Sagi heads to their hotel but cannot find them so even if I sign up, there will only be 5 of us so the tour is off. I'm almost relieved as I really want to get the Visa done.

Itamar Jacked Up to Start Riding

Itamar wants to cycle the Death Road tomorrow so Sagi, Bar and myself decide to join him so we head off to find a tour company to book with before they close for the evening. Once we start looking into it, Rachel decides that she wants to come as well. At first she was nervous because she does not ride much and the reputation of the road made her a bit uncomfortable. I think now that Bar is coming, Rachel is a bit more comfortable because she knows they will ride together at a slower pace so she won't just get left behind on her own. It turns out that Sagi is a champion cross country rider in Israel and he is very focused on finding a company with good bikes which is great as far as I'm concerned; you

want a good bike when riding the "Death Road." Just before the tour companies close, we find a good shop with bikes that Sagi likes for $80US per person. We will be their only riders which we like as well so we sign up.

The next morning, we meet at a cafe for breakfast at 7:15AM and the tour van picks us up at 8:00AM. The bikes are all on top of the van and there are 6 matching red Shemano bikes with front and back shocks and they look almost brand new. It takes us about 90 minutes to drive to the start of the ride at 4800m altitude. We all gear up with knee anpads, elbow pads, gloves, biking pants and

Sagi & Itamar Checking Out 1 of Many Waterfalls

shirt plus a helmet. Our guide, Simon, gives us some instructions on how the bikes work with the most important being in regards to the brakes because we will be going downhill almost all the way. We ride around the parking lot for a few minutes, add some air to a couple of tires, and we are off.

The first 30 minutes of riding is down the main paved highway as we are not yet on the Death Road so we need to be careful of vehicles, especially the trucks. Sagi, Itamar and I are just flying down the highway and we are pleased that there is very little traffic. The straight sections of the road are steep and we get going pretty fast with no pedalling required. The road flattens as it starts to twist and turn, Sagi and Itamar pedal hard on these sections but with more weight, I just fly around these sections without needing to pedal at all, I often actually have to brake to slow down a bit.

We stop every 10 minutes or so to let everyone catch up.

Sagi and Bar

The van always follows the last rider and it even has a backup bike in case some one has equipment problems. We soon come to a Y in the road where the dirt Death Road starts. The road is covered in a heavy white mist and visibility is only a 100m or so and a misty rain is falling. Simon tells us this is typical weather for this time of year and it should stop once we drop another 700 or 800m in altitude. The road is very narrow especially on the turns. Much of the road is only wide enough for 1 vehicle, I can't imagine trucks and buses travelling in both directions. The road has been closed for 7 years since a new road was completed. Now the only traffic are a couple of local buses a day, the odd local car and the support vans for riders like us.

Itamar and Rachel

On one side of the road is a rock wall that is covered in thick jungle vegetation and on the other side is a sheer drop. With the heavy mist, you can't see very far down but Simon tells me that many spots along this cliff face at the top of the road have an uninterrupted drop of more than 1 kilometer. Part of me wishes I could see this while another part of me is glad I can't. There are many waterfalls along the rock wall side of the road, some just pour down on the road out of the mists above. As I look off the cliff side of the road, I can see heavy jungle poking out here and there through the mist. The ride is pretty easy as the road is a hard pack dirt and the slope just allows us to coast well braking here and there to keep our speed down to a controllable level. The only danger is going too fast, losing control and going over the cliff.

A Hairpin Turn in the Mist

After stopping to let everyone catch up, we start off again and I almost immediately blow my rear tire. I come to a stop safely and the support van is right there so I quickly switch bikes and I'm off again. When we come to our next stop 10 minutes down the road, Simon repairs my tire so I can get back on the main bike. I'm glad because the spare bike's tires were almost bald and I could feel the spare bike slide around a lot more on the wet road. After about 40 minutes, we finally seem to be coming out of the mist and rain but the valley is still far below us. It was cold when we started the ride but now that we have dropped about 1500m, it is starting to get hot and humid and we all start removing some layers. I'm soon riding in shorts and a t-shirt but I keep my knee and elbow pads on.

As we get to the bottom of the valley, we come across 2 spots where a small stream crosses the road. The waters only about 20cms deep so we are able to ride right through. We also come to the only 2 flat areas on the entire road, one is about 1km long and the other is about 3 kms. Finally, we come to the outskirts of Coroico where we are stopping to load the bikes. We are now at 1100m altitude in the Yungas valley which is near the start of the Amazon jungle and we have dropped approximately 3700m in less than 3 hours riding. 

The van drives us to a small resort 10 minutes away where we are having lunch. There is also showers

and a pool here but the pool water looks stagnant and gross and there is no hot water in the showers, but we have a nice buffet lunch. It's about 5:00PM when we get back in the van for the 3 hour drive back to La Paz, we take the new road not the Death Road back. Based on all the crosses that we saw during the ride, the road was apply named. There was one spot with many crosses and a small temple to the Virgin Mary, a bus went over the cliff at this spot killing all 27 people that were on it. And we never had to ride far before passing a cross or 2 at the side of the road. I just can't imagine this road with 2-way traffic. We arrive back in La Paz at around 8:00PM. We are all tired and just head back to our rooms. I'm not that hungry as lunch was big and late but I grab some snacks at a local store before heading to bed.

The next day is a Friday and I'm focused on getting my Brazilian tourist visa application completed. I head to the Brazilian Embassy in the morning and find out the visa requirements. I fill out the online application, get a passport size photo taken of me and print out some credit card statements that the visa application requires. I then go back to the Embassy and provide them this info plus pay a $65US visa fee. The visa should take 2 full business days to process so I'm hoping to pick it up on Wednesday but the lady at the Embassy tells me that there is a Census being taken throughout all of Bolivia on Wednesday so everything in the whole country and all of La Paz will be closed. So the visa should be ready for pickup anytime after noon on Thursday. I have to provide my passport with the visa application so I can't travel anywhere too far or by plane.

Itamar and Rachel

That evening, I have dinner at a Thai restaurant just down the street from my hostel. What a mistake, almost as soon as I leave the restaurant, I'm not feeling well and I spend the next 3 days never straying far from a bathroom. I do virtually nothing these 3 days except write a couple of blogs and upload a bunch of photos to Picasa. But one thing that I do is confirm the dates for Carnival this year in Brazil. Carnival starts on February 8th and ends on the 13th. This is a couple of weeks earlier than I expected and I'm now going to be crunched for time to get all the way down to Tierra del Fuego at the southern tip of the continent and back up through Argentina and then get to Rio before the 8th. I'm not going to be able to spend as much time in Bolivia, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay as I would like. I decide to fly


Coming Out of the Mist

 from Buenos Aires to Rio to give me more time. Then after Carnival, I'll travel south along the coast back to Uruguay and maybe parts of northern Argentina. When I was riding the Death Road, Simon our guide had mentioned that it is rainy season in the Bolivian jungle when he heard we were thinking of going there. He said that there would be twice the number of bugs and half as many animals around, not exactly the kind of combination that I want. So I will postpone my jungle adventures until after Carnival to give me more time in Patagonia. I also book a hostel for 10 days spanning Carnival in Rio, it was about the only room at a somewhat reasonable price left in te whole city. I use the word reasonable quite loosely as the room will cost me $1500US for 10 nights which is almost 10 times its normal rate but at least I have a room.

Bar Riding Through a Stream

I was planning on heading to Coroico in the Yunga Valley while waiting for my visa as it is supposed to be a nice town with a number of good day hikes but I just don't feel able to travel with the way I am feeling. And by the time I'm feeling better late Monday, it just seems like too much trouble to go to Coroico for only 2 days. So, I decide just to stay in La Paz until I pickup my visa and then I'm going to catch a night bus to Uyuni to see the salt flats. Hopefully, I can get a night bus on Thursday but I don't want to book it until I have the visa and my passport. I decide to go to a movie that Monday night and I see the new Ben Affleck movie called Argo about the American hostages in Iran, it was pretty good.

The next day, I finally decide not to buy any camping equipment as I feel that the $300 I would need to spend can pay for equipment rentals when I need it. I do however need some new shoes. My Morrell hiking shoes have seen better days, I've worn off most of the tread, the rubber sole that wraps around the toe of one shoe is starting to peel back and the leather part of the shoes never recovered from getting wet on the Salkantay trek. I spend most of Tuesday trying to find any size 12 shoes. Most shop keepers just shake their heads when I tell them my size but I actually find a store with a couple of pairs of Keen 3\4 cut hiking boots in size 12. They are last years model and are on sale, they are the only size that they have (apparently there isn't much of a demand for size 12) and cost me a little over $100US. The regular price is over double this so I'm pretty pleased with the purchase. I will hang on to my Morrells, they will be my "I don't care what happens to them" wet jungle shoes.

While shopping for shoes, I find out that absolutely everything will be closed tomorrow for the Census and it will be illegal to even be outside on the streets. So, I stock up on some food, I buy buns, tuna, fruit, snacks, water and other drinks to get me through the day. Local Bolivians have to be at home and government representatives will visit each home to manually take the census. They last did this was 11 years ago and I just imagine what the cost of shutting down a country for a day is. That evening, the internet at the hostel goes down and they won't be able to have anyone come fix it until after the census. That sucks as I was planning on working a lot on my blog.

The next morning I'm happy to see they are serving breakfast which is included with the accommodations. I was worried that there would be no staff but one of the housekeepers lives at the hostel with her husband who works at the front desk. There is quite a few fellow travellers eating breakfast and we are all talking about what we are going to do today. Even though I can't post it, I spend the morning writing a blog. Then, I head down to the common area where I find about 8 or 10 fellow travellers sitting and talking. There is 3 people from Spain, a woman from New Zealand, a woman from the Netherlands, a woman from Brazil, a guy from Venezuela and 2 couples from Germany.

It's about lunch time and apparently a restaurant just down the street is illegally open. One of the Spanish guys is going to go there and order lunch for himself and his friends and bring it back. The housekeeper will escort him there in case he is stopped by the police. More than an hour goes by and they don't return and then someone from the neighbourhood stops by to tell the guy working at the front desk that his wife and a guest got arrested a while ago not far from the hostel. We hear nothing for an hour or so when they finally return. They got taken to one of the police stations and it looked like they were going to be thrown in jail until the police realized that the guy was a tourist from Spain. Then the tone of the police completely changed and they were soon released because they did not want a tourist to get a bad impression on the Blivian police. All of us end up heading to this restaurant for dinner. It was very strange walking the deserted streets of La Paz because this city's streets are always so packed with pedestrians, vehicles and street vendors. It reminds me of a scene from a zombie movie called 28 Days showing a deserted London in the day time. Luckily, we don't get arrested this time.

Over the course of the day, I get talking to Adriana who is from Rio de Janeiro, although I already have a room, she owns a hostel and invites me to come to her neighbourhood for some of the Carnival festivities. I'm pretty sure I will take her up on her offer as it would be nice to get some local knowledge on the festivities.

The next day, I pickup my Brazilian Visa at noon sharp and I'm pleased it was there waiting for me. I then head to the bus station to buy a ticket on the night bus to Uyuni. Unfortunately, all the bus companies that go there are completely sold out so I buy a ticket for the following evening, I guess I'm staying here one more night. Luckily my hostel still has a room because I had checked out before going to the embassy.

The next day I spend some time working on uploading photos before deciding to do a little more shopping. I buys some gifts for my sister and her family. La Paz is really 1 big market full of interesting clothes, leather goods and trinkets at very affordable prices. La Paz is always a real busy city and it's often hard to walk down the sidewalk and the locals have to be the slowest walking pedestrians that I have ever seen. They often are walking so slow, they are barely moving but they like to do this 3 or 4 peope abreast making it hard to pass them, it is just maddening if you are trying ti get somewhere.

My bus is leaving at 7:00PM, it is more than 12 hours to Uyuni but I splurged and bought a 1st class ticket to hopefully get some sleep on the bus. I'm glad to be moving again as I ended up being in La Paz much longer than I planned. I should have gone to the Brazilian Embassy the day after I arrived and I would have left much earlier. I plan to do a 4 day Jeep tour of the Salar de Uyuni (slat flats) and my tour will end in San Pedro de Atacama Chile. I will then start to make my way south to Patagonia. I feel that I did not get a real chance to see Bolivia like I had planned to, well that is the way it works out. It's too bad that I did not end up seeing Shane and Seleka after the first day in La Paz. The last I heard, they were off to the Bolivian jungle. I wonder if they had some good weather and enjoyed the jungle? Hopefully, we will cross paths again in Argentina and same goes for Rachel and Itamar. 

More on the Salar de Uyuni and San Pedro de Atacama Chile next time.