La Paz

We returned last Tuesday from an awesome trip to La Paz. The people in Santa Cruz seemed very concerned about us going to La Paz. We were repeatedly told how dangerous it was and to watch out for thiefs and fake police and taxi drivers. We were also warned that the people of La Paz don´t like gringos so to not be surprised if we were treated badly. Fortunately we encountered none of these problems, though we were in very touristy parts of La Paz the entire time. While I can´t say for sure (its really hard to gain insight into the political situation of another country), it seems like there are a lot of tensions in Bolivia right now between the indigenous people (predominately Evo supporters) and people who live in the ¨half moon¨ (eastern side of Bolivia, predominately anit-Evo). While I haven´t been able to get anyone to articulate clearly why they are for or against Evo, people on both sides are very passionate in their beliefs. It seemed that some of the warnings about La Paz were arising from tensions between these two groups.

Buttttt, back to the trip, it was awesome! We met up with my friend Howard (from Wake) who is currently traveling through South America until December. The first day we visited the various museums in La Paz, including a really interesting museum about the Coca leaf. We also took a half day trip to the Valley of the Moon and visited the witch market (got a lot of Christmas shopping out of the way).

Some of you hardcore blog followers (surely there are a few) may remember me mentioning that most dangerous road in the world is somewhere in Bolivia. Well we found it and we biked down it! This trip was by far the most exciting thing we did in La Paz. The trips starts out on a pavement, but after about 30 min of biking the road becomes completely gravel. The entire ride was about 60 km with drops off the side reaching 1000 meters at some points. Needless to say, we (and by we I mean Maya and myself) were riding very very slowly. The rest of our group was apparently professional mountain bikers who rode down at incredible speeds. I did feel better about my biking abilities when we passed three other groups on the way down, I think we just had a ridiculously fast group. The guides also took incredible pictures of the scenery (and us) which we´d love to upload but continue to have trouble with the computers/cameras/something. The trip ended at a hotel where we ate lunch and swam in the pool.

Our guide told us 17 people have been killed doing the road on bikes, but apparently most of those accidents occurred with cars before Bolivia built a new road about 3 years ago. Since the new road, he said only one person has been killed on a bike. The new road was the most expensive road in Bolivia to build, but since our guide said that tour buses and trucks would fall off the most dangerous road almost monthly, I´d say it was worth the cost. I tried to confirm these facts without much success, so take what you will from them. (I did find an article stating ¨at least 13 people¨ have been killed biking).