Death Road adventures in La Paz
I’m back, with a new blog name and a new post. I’ve decided to change the name to give me a little more freedom to write about topics other than travel. I’ve got a lot of ideas for posts floating around in my brain at the moment, so decided now was the time to make the change. Hopefully it motivates me to write more! This post is a continuation of the travel posts, but you can expect more of a variety of topics from me from now on.
So at this point in our travels, we left Sucre and arrived in La Paz, the world’s highest capital. La Paz isn’t the most beautiful place in the world, but it definitely offers opportunities to have a lot of fun. We stayed at the notorious Wild Rover hostel, one of several of these Irish hostels which can be found across Bolivia and Peru. It’s a chain known for being big on partying, and it was definitely true to its reputation. Chris and Drew, the two Australians we’d been travelling with since the Salt Flats, had arrived the day before us, and when we arrived in the early afternoon we found them nursing a hangover with two guys from Oxford that they’d met at the hostel, Tim and Adam.
In between hangovers and nights out, we did try and see what else La Paz had to offer, starting with the cable car which locals use as a means of public transport. We took a cable car up to one of the viewpoints scattered throughout the city, and it was fascinating watching this sprawling metropolis unravel underneath us – the sheer volume of it was almost overwhelming. That morning we also decided to satisfy our cravings for gringo food, and we went to Cafe del Mundo, a lovely little cafe with a huge variety of dishes from all over the world. Actually, our time in Wild Rover hostels was dominated by familiar food, as the bar in the hostels served British culinary delights including chips and curry sauce and fry ups.
Undoubtedly, the highlight of La Paz was our day trip to Death Road. We went with a company called Altitude Biking who have an office inside the hostel, and it cost 400 bolivianos plus 50 bolivianos admission fee to the road itself, coming to about £50, which was absolutely worth it. Death Road is a road which was cut into the side of a mountain by Paraguayan prisoners, and it gets its grim name from the high number of deaths which have happened on it. So, naturally, it has become a tourist attraction, with thousands of tourists zooming down it on bikes every year (tourist deaths are rare, though apparently one or two still happen annually when people don’t pay enough attention). Halfway down the road is a zipline which goes over a section of rainforest at a height of several hundred metres, which was one of the best things I’ve ever done. The trip was so much fun, although I did end up covered in hundreds of mosquito bites, which was somewhat less fun.
On our final day in La Paz we went to the witches’ market, which is a small street filled with market stalls and little shops which sold cauldrons, ingredients for potions, and, most bizarrely, had dead llama foetuses hanging from the ceiling, which I believe are used as tokens of good luck. After this we went to the bus station, where loud cries of ticket sellers yelling “PUUUUUNO, CUUUUUSCO” filled the building, and on we went to Lake Titicaca for our next adventure.
Un abrazo,
Lola
So at this point in our travels, we left Sucre and arrived in La Paz, the world’s highest capital. La Paz isn’t the most beautiful place in the world, but it definitely offers opportunities to have a lot of fun. We stayed at the notorious Wild Rover hostel, one of several of these Irish hostels which can be found across Bolivia and Peru. It’s a chain known for being big on partying, and it was definitely true to its reputation. Chris and Drew, the two Australians we’d been travelling with since the Salt Flats, had arrived the day before us, and when we arrived in the early afternoon we found them nursing a hangover with two guys from Oxford that they’d met at the hostel, Tim and Adam.
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| View of La Paz from the cable car |
In between hangovers and nights out, we did try and see what else La Paz had to offer, starting with the cable car which locals use as a means of public transport. We took a cable car up to one of the viewpoints scattered throughout the city, and it was fascinating watching this sprawling metropolis unravel underneath us – the sheer volume of it was almost overwhelming. That morning we also decided to satisfy our cravings for gringo food, and we went to Cafe del Mundo, a lovely little cafe with a huge variety of dishes from all over the world. Actually, our time in Wild Rover hostels was dominated by familiar food, as the bar in the hostels served British culinary delights including chips and curry sauce and fry ups.
 |
| Ready for our trip down Death Road |
Undoubtedly, the highlight of La Paz was our day trip to Death Road. We went with a company called Altitude Biking who have an office inside the hostel, and it cost 400 bolivianos plus 50 bolivianos admission fee to the road itself, coming to about £50, which was absolutely worth it. Death Road is a road which was cut into the side of a mountain by Paraguayan prisoners, and it gets its grim name from the high number of deaths which have happened on it. So, naturally, it has become a tourist attraction, with thousands of tourists zooming down it on bikes every year (tourist deaths are rare, though apparently one or two still happen annually when people don’t pay enough attention). Halfway down the road is a zipline which goes over a section of rainforest at a height of several hundred metres, which was one of the best things I’ve ever done. The trip was so much fun, although I did end up covered in hundreds of mosquito bites, which was somewhat less fun.
 |
| Looking over the edge of Death Road |
On our final day in La Paz we went to the witches’ market, which is a small street filled with market stalls and little shops which sold cauldrons, ingredients for potions, and, most bizarrely, had dead llama foetuses hanging from the ceiling, which I believe are used as tokens of good luck. After this we went to the bus station, where loud cries of ticket sellers yelling “PUUUUUNO, CUUUUUSCO” filled the building, and on we went to Lake Titicaca for our next adventure.
Un abrazo,
Lola
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