You might have noticed I've stolen half the title from Gerald Brennan so you may fear a half serious travel piece. I wouldn't get too worried on that count given that any attempt to mix the themes of 'cycling' and 'Bolivia' can only result in the absurd. Absurd physical demands did approach the serious, but more 'seriously ridiculous' than anything else. Ridiculous as some of the routes we cycled were improbable, and improbable is a good word to use in relation to many things Bolivian: the outrageous scenery, the exhausting routes, the sorry history and the fascinating state of current affairs. What is probable is that if you were to go to Bolivia you would have a very enjoyable and interesting time as it is very beautiful and friendly, and things have a tendency to happen in a a country that is the geopolitical embodiment of the 'Latin American question'. So you should go, though I wouldn't take a bike; it really is a seriously ridiculous and absurd thing to do.
In Bolivia it's like historical things are always afoot. There lots of history to time available, most of it unfortunate and little of it making much sense. It is as labyrinthine as the roads and as hard to follow as the maps on which things tend not to join or add up. We can make the road map join up: our route was from Villazón on the Argentinean border, through Tupiza to the Salar de Uyuni. From here we curved anti-clockwise through Potosí, Sucre, Cochabamba and on to La Paz; respectively a large colonial silver mine town, the pretty colonial period capital, a modern, busy and warm city and the world's highest capital, stunningly situated and very attractive. On the 'incident' front, during our journey four of the nine provinces that make up Bolivia became no-go areas for the president as they tried to claim independence, major sectors of the economy went on strike, blocked roads and staged city centre punch-ups and the man trying to keep the whole show running turned out for a ninety minute ding-dong affair at the miners cooperative stadium in Potosí, during which he slotted one home from the penalty spot and dribbled round a large dog that had wandered on to the pitch. If it is hard to imagine what being Head of State actually involves on a day to day basis it is even harder to think what one would do in the face of seeming national meltdown. The normal response in Bolivia has been 'get booted out by the military' so the fact that to this day Evo Morales survives in power is testament to his alternative course of action: play footy. Obviously, I like his style.
Of Big Evo more later. While the transport lobby were kicking off in Santa Cruz state and the president's eleven were kicking off on the pitch we were kicking off with 317Km from Villazón to the world's largest salt flat at 3700m above sea level on the altiplano at Uyuni. The route we took was staggering both scenically and bodily. Al noted that this remote spot, the very wide purple bit on your Times World Atlases, while certainly 'alti' is not very 'plano'. The change from the panoramic country in north western Argentina to here was that now we climbed into the mountain scenery itself, still through gorges of bright coloured, folded and fluted rock but also up on to ridges and shoulders of green mountains up to 4300m, overlooked by the volcano Cholorque. We looked across vast distances westwards to the snow peaks on the Chilean border and eastwards to the Cordillera de Chichas. The 'road' surface was bare rock which deteriorated to sand in the dunes before Uyuni and for a period of time in the middle was water - we arrived in the town of Atocha by way of a wide river. 'Improbably'. There must have been another way into town judging by the looks of wonder as we emerged from the valley but then Atocha doesn't get many visitors, although its houses, that seem chiseled out of the yellow craggy surrounds, and an active pithead are more instructive as to a working Bolivian mining community than the city centre of Potosi. It is a poor place but the communities on the mining strip of the Bolivian altiplano, historically one of the worlds richest and most varied, do not reflect the enormous riches underneath (zinc in this case). The majority of settlements here owe their existence to a mine, shops full of miners kit and the odd mini-bus full of knackered miners being above ground indications of subterranean activity. Leaving Atocha a remote, crowded and ramshackle miners cemetery was another. Large ghost towns also exist up on mountain sides so, dead or alive (and the era of vast silver and tin production is gone), the mine leaves its mark on Bolivia.
Contrary to what might be expected the Salar de Uyuni would be the best surface we enjoyed in the first week and a half in Bolivia. It might be salt but at least it is packed down. Of course, it provides other challenges: navigating is odd given that everything is white, and the sun starts to attack from new angles. I burnt my bottom lip in a nasty way that would not heal until Cusco and the misery was compounded by the prominence of soup in the Bolivian menu. Nonetheless, the crossing of this dry sea was memorable and waking to see dawn after camping on a rock 'island' surrounded by distant volcanoes was a glorious experience. Cycling on to Potosí was more gruelling than glorious. We managed it in two days but really should have taken three as we finished the second well into the dark. The only other cycle tourists we met during our time in Bolivia managed to hospitalise themselves on this stretch so maybe we really should have taken the bus. This would have denied us some epic ascents and we would have avoided the misery, oh absolute misery, of the final turn around the base of the Cerro Rico which overlooks the city. Some sort of ghoulish struggle on these slopes seems to me an entirely appropriate way to meet this hill, one could be labelled the world's most important mountain. Yes, more important than Roseberry Topping. It was so dark and wet on our way round I thought Al (leading the sorry procession by virtue of having a working torch) had taken a wrong turn and we'd started the mine tour early. Why this ravaged and lowered cone is so important can be found in the famous works of Eduardo Galleano so I won't bore you by repeating it all here as if I'd just thought it up. So we can just note that over 8 million people died here in the worlds largest silver mine down which 10,000 people still work (silver is not exhausted as Galleano thought, though second in importance to tin) in conditions which can reduce life expectancy to two years for operators of heavy machinery. I would recommend a visit down the shafts, although the industry that has sprung up around it is pretty macabre, the attitude of many visitors depressing, and the conditions themselves pretty nasty. I think the shock of being below ground in such confined conditions (tunnels are hand dug and require crawling) can render objective commentary difficult and it would be more interesting to hear the impressions of a European miner (for example) than someone with my soft background. Talking of which I was gutted to find I managed to smack my head on every plank and strut down there and then get lost, which begs the question; what are bandy legs good for if not for getting about down 'pit?! 'Rock all' I guess.
Back above ground there were fireworks in the main square of Potosí to celebrate anniversary of the founding of the city and fireworks in our toilet to mark the 12th hour anniversary of the consumption of an iffy quinoa soup. The inhabitants of both were kept up all night by the rumblings. I spent a good couple of days trying to track down Evo who was in town for the celebrations, Potosí being a 'loyal' province for Bolivia's first indigenous leader. This support is no surprise as exploitation of its massive subsoil wealth has left little but poverty despite over 400 years of production and it is thus home to a large number of disgruntled people who would support any attempt to retain the proceeds 'in house', which would be the basic principle of the current regime. But Potosí is now really the emblem of the Bolivian riddle (huge natural resources - South America's poorest country). The present day wealth comes from different subsoil reserves in the area known as the 'media-Luna; four provinces in the north-eastern jungle and chaco zones from which Brasil and Argentina buy their natural gas requirements. Big business and now appropriated by the state. The prefects of these provinces have claimed independence, pretty much prohibited Morales from entering and rejected the Bolivian nation. Of course they would be making the same worthy appeal for autonomy if the gas reserves were in the other half of the country and they were living in a shed on twenty quid a month. Ho hum. Anyway, in a bizarre reversal of roles I attended all the civic functions in town while Evo avoided me by playing football until our paths crossed in the street and I was able to deliver my personal message: "Evo, get the Uyuni - Potosí highway tarmaced"! He's a big lad and certainly the sort of bloke you would pass to and expect to get the ball back from. Incidentally I've now seen him take two penalties (he managed a game in Lima when we were there) and he always sticks them the same way. I'm not going to reveal which way in case the CIA are reading this and send a goalkeeper to stop one in a bid to undermine his authority (as per the plot to shave off Castro's beard). As it is I've now seen a bit of Bolivian professional football and there is no goalkeeper in the country capable of stopping anything. Any country performing worse than the Bolivian national team should be utterly ashamed of themselves: Perú take a bow!
Back on the road and the cycling became substantially easier as the route to Sucre was paved (220Km). This is a very charming city and, whereas we were the only cyclists of any sort in Potosí (no air and comically hilly), we entered town in the company of friendly local racing cyclist, Guido. White colonial arcades and charming plazas here. We scored a pirate copy of windows and could upload photos again! The road from here to Cochabamba (441Km) illustrates the wild variety of the countryside in Bolivia. We had arrived from austere mountain tops and now descended hairpin roads to lush tropical valleys of Amazon tributaries, the paved section ending as we tackled 40Km-long climbs on cobbles (Paris - Roubaix anyone?!) and coped with lows of 1500m to highs of near 3800m, finishing with a day of limestone / pennine scenery that made it seem more likely that Bakewell would be found on the other side of the hill and not the amazon rainforest. The night before Cochabamba (2560m) we stayed in interesting accommodation in the truck-stop town of Epizana where the delights of the 'Epizana Hilton' were rejected (no shower, floor of mud) for the now infamous 'Hotel Tunari' in which I'm not sure if we were more scared of entering or leaving the 'room'. During the night a herd of pigs caused a row by trying to break in and we thus decided upon a crack-of-dawn escape, which was thwarted by the evil owner press-ganging us into moving a fridge through a muddy sea into her back room. To no thanks. Pah!
From Epizana we would be on tarmac until, well, Boa Vista in Brasil! (On that note some people have expressed admiration for our cycling about on all sorts of rubbish up to this point and I have to say, thanks, but I took no pleasure from it. I'd tarmac the lot!) Before La Paz (413 Km from Cochabamba) we entered the land of the long climbs, dragging up steep pulls for two days to La Cumbre at 4496m above sea level which will be our highest point of the trip. We made a slight descent to the bleak altiplano around Oruro, passing through grey truckers towns before the excitement of La Paz. When you have to go down a steep hill to enter the world's highest capital city you know you've been monkeying about at silly heights. Nonetheless it is a true plummet from the featureless plain into the canyon that houses the long and thin city, a drop that we accomplished in a freezing hailstorm. The setting is really dramatic and we added our own theatre by arriving in the main square shattered, cramped up and frozen to the handlebars. There is something truly comical in a state of desperate physical exhaustion amidst urban civilization. Comical for everyone else. What is appropriate to an arrival on a mountain top is ludicrous in a city centre where everyone else is ambling about and drinking coffees in street side cafes, but such was our condition on our arrival in La Paz. To thaw-out required the 'shower for an hour' project. So, anyway, everything about La Paz surprised and pleased me and I think it would be an excellent place to visit - without a bike of course. I want to thank Maria Isabel for showing me round and helping me be trendy in cool Sopocachi (!!!) - ¡Isha, q eres una estrella tía! There is great theatre, excellent galleries and a very beautiful post office. No, really. While I was knocking about here the Montgomery boys were proving they had gone from cycling zeros to heroes by tackling the worlds most dangerous road on an excursion from town. I adopted the 'I don't go to the office on a weekend' approach instead and missed out on trashing someone else's bike for a change. La Paz is fascinating.
I can honestly say that the climb back out of La Paz to the mayhem of the 'Aymara' city of El Alto was preferable to the descent - a reflection of the horrors of the latter rather than any joy had in a 90 minute haul up a motorway. The views were tremendous; what a strange place to stick a city. Now it was only one day to the shores of Lake Titicaca, or more accurately the off-shoot called Lago Huiñaymarca, where we stayed in a hostal owned by a local reed boat builder. Blue, blue, light blue in the middle of the bleak and ancient altiplano. How very improbable! It was a straight forward day for myself and Montgomery junior but Burns was suffering with faintness caused by a stomach bug (finally defeated in Ecuador, yes, miles away) that made progress of any sort quite heroic. There is a photo in the Bolivian albums showing what an effort this was, truly admirable, as there are photos which should link to most of the places mentioned in this blog. Apologies for the delay in the posting of it but I think you should go and look at the place for yourself. Take some oxygen. Don't take a bike. Evo Morales might still be at the helm - ask him if he's got that road tarmaced yet.
Midd
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