BOLIVIA
I must say, I really liked Bolivia from the outset. The
vibe, the streets. The roads also seemed more complete than in Peru. We had
team dinner with Bec’s ring in Norwegian flame Marius, who we are certain
introduced himself as Maurice and put ourselves to bed for our again
monotonously early wake up pre 6am to do the Death Road.
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| BJs Cousin Eddie |
So, I certainly didn’t tell Mum I was doing Death Road, but
having spoken to my trusty old mate Girthy who informed me he had done it on no
sleep, I decided to follow the beacon – Phoebs, and have a crack. Our group was
14 young somethings from all over, led by a loose as Kiwi called Tim. Our
little cycling fam of speed demons Phoebs and Rhys, middle pack Mones + Bundy
Rin bringing up the rear met some new buddies, including a small world reunion
when I realised the guy I got the perfect selfie with Eddie was my Cousin
Marc’s wife’s BJ’s cousin!
We took off for the first 20km test on our awesome mountain
bikes and instantly I felt quite unsettled. I consciously tried to relax, as I
felt myself gripping as the wind ripped in to me flogging it down the scenic
pre-death road, road. The stress and concentration balanced out, and for some
reason I momentarily forgot that I was legging it on rocks, on the world’s
deadliest 30km road, 300m above the valley. We stopped along the way to be
briefed on what was coming up – pot holes, water fall crossings and steep
slopes and hairpins. We were told stories about the thousands of slaves who
lost their lives building the road, hundreds of buses and cars that were lost
along the way due to slipping off the edge and mentally for me there was so
much concentration, that I forgot I was scared of heights.
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| Me on Death Road |
Phoebs bloody killed it, and so did Rhys, setting the pace
up front. I was happy to chill at the middle of the group without any heroes up
my clack. Our stops were breath taking which made everything worth it. Only one minor injury when a large rock kicked up in the wheel and hit my shin.
Finally, we made it to our final stop, an animal sanctuary
at the bottom of the hill, but not before being told about the worlds saddest
love story – when a man lost his whole family off the side of death road. He
then spent the next 15 years guiding the traffic through the narrow one-way
track, and as a thank-you had been gifted a home for his efforts. He was
standing at the bottom of the town.
After dinner and beers at the sanctuary, we then jumped in
the van to go back up Death Road. By this stage I decided more beers sounded
better than being sober, and thankfully Phoebs bartered with the shop keeper to
get 2 beers for the bargain price of 40 Bolivianos (basically all we had left)
instead of 50 or getting just one to share! The next funny thing was the toilet
stop on Death road. I was losing my shit laughing, as Phoebe managed to find
some concrete cavernous ruins to pee in between, while I was perched behind the
world’s smallest rock and tree.
Day 9 of our tour we had a day in La Paz. We did a City Tour
in the morning where we went to the
moon valley and I nearly shit myself on the
Cable Car yellow just after I had said to Phoebs I think I was conquering my
fear of heights! The cable car system is the Bolivian equivalent to the tube,
it is super impressive, spanning 30 KMs and reaching a height of 12k ft. I
hated being so high up, even though I had bragged to Phoebs in the AM that I
felt I had conquered my fear of heights, between Macchu Piccu and the Death
Road. The afternoon we came back to town and did some shopping. I bought a
Llama and a couple of synthetically real Alpaca jumpers. We left for our flight
to Uyuni at 7pm and arrived that evening to be reunited with Rhys who had in
earlier in the day and by this evening his high-altitude constant illness had
set in and he had short vision and a puffer fish face.
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| Rhys and I in our Alpaca Jumpers |
The next day we woke up to our driver telling us to have
everything we needed in our day bag. So of
course, I left the fly swat I was going to use at the salt flats in my big bag
so instead had to settle for Shrek, a wine bottle and a Pringles tin as
apparatus for pics. We also used Rhys Akubra as a prop, but the new group
dickhead Ashton Chivers (who has the same last name as Girthy yet lacks any
form of personality and charisma I would probably stop talking to Chris if I
thought this sociopath was related to him) fucked up the video by jumping off
the high side of the hat brim.
That night was the first of our basic accommodation, which
made me take away my initial assessment of Bolivia being the best and instead I
decided, apart from La Paz it was a shit hole. Here I finally had a go at the
rude Frenchie’s and informed them that we were on holidays too so there was no
need to be a rude arsehole and ruin everyone else’s holiday. Fair to say like
in the war he avoided confrontation for the rest of the trip, which suited me.
We gained a couple of Germans in our 4-wheel drive back in Uyuni however, and
one said on this day she was claustrophobic in the back, despite the rest of us
being 5’9 and above, apparently the shortest chick in the Cruiser was
claustrophobic, forcing Phoebs in to the back for the perilous 7-hour journey
which was shit house. I sat in the middle and played bangers whilst kept
getting told off by Beymar for trying to put my feet up and slamming the door.
The final morning in Bolivia had us seeing yet another
lagoon and stacked rock tree, plus a Volcano which bordered Chile, which by now
I was very much looking forward to as I’d been told that the accommodation was
really nice. We left the bumpy dirt roads and broken boom gated border crossing
of Bolivia and entered what seemed like the Hunger Games equivalent of the
Capital with asphalt roads and a luxurious drive in border crossing drive thru
shed where the security played table tennis and bangers. This started the
precedent, with all the music played throughout Chile far surpassing both Peru
and Bolivia’s flutey music.
CHILE
We arrived to the luxury of a 30 second warm shower in San
Pedro de Atacama and had a posh team dinner and some Chilean Syrah before
settling for the eve.
Finally, a sleep in the morning, followed by breaky and a
wine tour. We didn’t have Ashton as he lonered himself sand boarding the dunes.
Instead we were greeted by the world’s nicest smiliest man- a Haitian man
called Noel (like the Christmas carol) and donned dresses and stepping out
shirts and went on a pretty boring wine tour, followed by tasting. I realised
at this point, I should always book ‘wine tasting’ and not ‘wine tours’ as I
really don’t care how it gets to my local Majestic Wine carton for 10£ a
bottle. The afternoon we were ill informed by Wilson, to just wear good shoes,
and failed to tell us/ me that a short dress and g-banger was not appropriate
for the cave crawling and climbing. We were the best dressed at the Chilean
Moon Valley by a rolling mile. We bunkered in to the bus post sunset and were
just about to take off back to town before realising that Ashton wasn’t there.
We contemplated leaving him, but decided we should probably wait. He
unapologetically boarded and we headed back to town, where we again
disassociated with him and headed for team dinner which was average, before
retiring.
A wake up the next day followed by another flight to
Santiago. We landed at the airport to a reunion party with the Pommy guy from
reading and old mate Ashton’s fling he had met sandboarding. I hadn’t seen Mr
Personality Ashton Kutcher talking much until this time, so it was apt that
upon arrival he left our group without saying bye.
We had lunch at Japanese and I disgusted Rhys by failing
with chopsticks. He made such a big deal that I became shitty and declined his
offer to teach me. I decided I would instead YouTube how to do it as a surprise
preparation for our future wedding. That afternoon we headed off exploring. Only
though by now I was over it so I decided to ditch and the group cable car / funicular
ride and instead wait for them at a pub. It was here I met two dudes- English Mark
and Venezuela Marcos who were having brewskies before hiking to the top in lieu
of the cable car. I was again reminded my gaydar was off when Mark went all
D&M and informed me that his wife and kid hadn’t been satisfied with moving
to San Pedro and instead he was doing it alone, mind you- working one week on
and one off didn’t sound too bad. He had met Marcos on a social man date website.
Anyway, Mark had the day off tomorrow so we decided to hang out. Everyone was
laughing by the time they reached me and I was already pissed! Of course, I had
made friends. We had a boozy final night with take-away brewskies and hangs at Rhys’s
before farewelling my holiday 10 and calling it a night.
The next morn I farewelled my PIC Phoebs back to Oz and consoled
Patrick who was mourning the loss of Rhys by this stage, and quoting Derek to
me to no avail. I have since watched a couple of episodes so can probably maintain
some future conversation relating. I checked out of the rank poor businessman stale
smoke hotel, and met Mark who had taken the world’s longest drive in and
concurrent I noticed his WhatsApp pic had changed from his wife to his kid...
interesting. I checked in to my luxurious hotel and checked out the pool deck before
deciding to hit town and grab a bite. Somehow, we ended up at a Barber shop
drinking espresso martini and again I was drunk. Not drunk enough to fall for
his scorned love affair just drunk enough to piss him off when he realised he couldn’t
have his cake and eat it to. We went back to the pool deck and had more
cocktails- the
Transfer to the airport to end the holiday. The Air France
flight wasn’t that bad this time, new screens with more than 4 movies and more
leg room. Two days recovery back in Londres before the former Yugoslavia tour. I’m
most looking forward to drinking tap water and throwing the toilet paper in to
the toilet. Adios friends hope you are still coherent after such long two part bloggage.
Less than a month before I am back in Oz!
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