Death Road (El Camino de la Muerte) La Paz

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Monday 07.05.2012
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Driving into the La Paz, the sight of the city is spectacular. The city sits in the valley and houses are built on the sides of the canyon and appear to just cling to it. In the background of the city are snowcapped mountains. totally by chance, our bus stopped just around the corner from the hostal that we had booked in. By the time we had walked …

We arrived in La Paz in true Bolivian fashion. After a Twelve hour overnight journey across bumpy roads the bus finally ran out of fuel about half a mile from the bus station.

We headed for our hostel, Loki in La Paz, which was to be our home for the next week. Loki is renowned for being a party hostel and with a bar open from 10am till …

De retour à La Paz pour terminer ces 2 riches semaines avec Sabrina, nous visitons la ville et achevons cette journée par un concert de musique traditionnelle. Comme à mon habitude, je prends quelques jours de repos, ce qui se résume finalement à dormir dans le même lit plus de 2 nuits, connaitre quelques commerçants du quartier et pouvoir vider …

La Paz is the capital city of Bolivia and it sits high up in the mountains at over 4000m (higher than all but the tallest mountains in Canada). The city is built upon the sides of the mountains and it is rare to find a street that isnt a steep hill of some kind. Which makes for a breathtaking experience, literally, as the the altitude makes it hard …

Before leaving Puno, the hostel manager advised there were strikes near Copacabana, which is one of the border crossings into Boliva. Just as well he told us as we heard some nightmare stories from travellers who got stuck going that route - 10km walk with backpacks, 2 taxi rides and a final bus trip!! Thankfully we managed to organise a bus trip …

One of the biggest attractions in Bolivia is taking a mountain bike 64 km downhill, on a road that when it was in use by cars, claimed up to 600 lives a year. The reason for this is basically because in many sections, the road is no wider than 3.2 meters, and can get very muddy during the rainy season, and of course, the edge of the road leads to a …

Hiya,

Another busy week in Bolivia! We had another couple of days in Copacabana which were very relaxing - we visited the Isle de Sol which is an island in the middle of lake titicaca and it is so beautiful! Maddy and I (Alex decided on more sleep!) got up early and took a boat to the island and trekked for 5 hours from one end to the …

Coming into La Paz there was only one option to get into our hostel - squeeze 6 tourists, one driver AND our massive backpacks into one car! This was because there was a protest going on where groups of workers were setting off explosives and blocking off roads.

We stayed at The Adventure Brewery Hostel. Jeff loved it, free beers every …

La Paz, the world's highest capital (although Sucre is the official capital most of the government meets in La Paz) sits at around 3700m above sea level. Coming into La Paz we noticed that the city expands in all directions going almost straight up the mountain sides with many switchbacks and ridiculously steep roads. The city is also surrounded by …

... intonation of a valley girl. Bubbly, retarded, you know the type. And, of course, she´s Canadian. Before leaving for Death Road, she asks ¨Ummm, can I still buy some Gatorade. Gatorade is just sooo good.¨ An Australian guy sarcasticly ...

... and had a good catch up session. The next day, we were off to do some extreme downhill mountain biking down Bolivia’s death road. The death road is the North Yungas Road that until recently was used as a real carriageway out of La Paz. Too many ...

... into a couple days ago.   However, this story is nothing like that. While taking our maiden voyage in Bolivia (Lake Titicaca to La Paz), we were ¨treated¨ to a dubbed version of Bruce Willis´ Tears of the ...

... scary because a bolivian guy who has been driving this road for 13 years (obviously too cocky and confident) decided to take the death road back in the jeep to save us half our..... he was hitting the corners at nail bittign speeds and i was glad ...

... fire tom had made looking up at a sky full of stars and trees full of fire flies. We rode up the death road from Corrico to La Paz passing gringos on pushbikes speeding the other way looking very scared. It had been fun when we had gone down the ...

... finding my way around La Paz, I signed up to mountain bike down the World's Most Dangerous Road, affectionately known as "The Death Road."  The WMDR is basically a one-lane dirt track that starts at 15,400 feet high above La Paz and ...

OK, this entry begins as a warning to anyone who wants to get their hair done in Bolivia... more speicifically, La Paz... Do it yourself! It's probably going to turn out more like what you wanted!!! I decided to use a hairdresser and dye my hair ...

... couple days in the pleasant little town of Coroico before returning to La Paz. For further reading and a rather grim article on one of the mountain bike fatalities on the Death Road, Click here Or Here to jump to more info on Gravity Assisted Mt. ...

... from a Spider monkey which took a shine to his beard (check out the video).  The journey back to La Paz (driving in the bus along Death Road) took 3 1/2 hours by which stage my arse had started to hurt and the bus was slightly uncomfortable - god ...

... fix the problem in your own back yard", thus one of the reasons for all the political conflict between Bolivia and the West.   Coca chewing aside, La Paz certainly did have a lot to keep us busy but we decided to spend Christmas in the Salar de ...