Craziest bus ride of my life
Trip Start
Mar 09, 2007
1
140
169
Trip End
??? ??, 2008
Rurrenabaque,
Bolivia
Monday, January 21, 2008
First off this bus is old and it's one of those buses that is lifted up, has some big as tires, and is one of those buses designed to handle a very very crappy road. It's the rainy season here in Bolivia, so a crappy road, mixed with lots of rain, creates mud slides, washed out roads and tons of mud (all three which we would encounter). Within 30 minutes of leaving La Paz, the lady next to Emilie (she was sitting right behind Jerbo and me) was having a seizure. Emilie moved seats. Some kid two seats away from her new seat started puking out the window about an hour later. At this point, I think Jeremy and I were both glad to be sitting next to a good friend. About 4 rows in front of us some dude was pouring his son's pee out the window using a plastic cup. The roads were so dizzying, the drop offs so big, the Irish were looking at the floor just to keep their minds strait and in composure. I'm just getting warmed up.
It rained the entire time, which would have been ok except for the fact that the roof was leaking right above my head. I could see it leaking on a few other people on various spots in front of me. Using two Zip-Lock bags, the coca leaf bag (including all the coca leaves), and my trusty carabiner, Jeremy and I were able to rig up a Rube Goldberg system to catch the dripping water. This worked fairly well, with an emptying required every now and again, and a couple drops leaking out from time to time. I would have been royally drenched otherwise, no empty seats on the bus to move to. There was a puppy that they originally let lose in the bottom baggage container and later brought up. It proceeded to lay a steaming pile a couple of rows behind us, right around the Irish. Two more dogs later joined. We kept hearing some birds chirping, turns out there were two small parrots riding along with us (some other lady tried to buy the parrots off of the lady owner, she really wanted those parrots) two rows in front.
You know those roof emergency exits on buses? Well the one two rows behind us was missing and was replaced with blue plastic tarp. I'm surprised it didn't leak water. Kids were sleeping in the isles. During the entire trip, three times our bus had to get jacked up to replace the tires.
I haven't even gotten to the scary part. There is a famous bike trip that most tourists do from La Paz, it's known as 'The World's Most Dangerous Road.' It was labelled as this by the Inter American Development Bank in 1995 and is located a bit more than an hour outside La Paz (the start of it). Chelsea and I actually took a bus ride up this road by accident when returning to La Paz from Coroico. The road to Rurrenabaque used to take this road, however a safer road was later funded due to deaths and now the new road is used. However this new stretch of road only bypasses the first 50 miles of the dangerous road to Rurrenabaque. We would be taking the rest of the road. All 18 hours more of it.
Saying that this road is dangerous is a sever understatement. It's just stupidly dangerous and unsafe. This road would never be allowed to exist in the US or any developed country. The fact that this is the main road to the north (its actually it's the 'highway' connecting to northern Bolivia but there is no way they should be allowed to call this a highway) is a total joke. The road is basically a dirt mountain road sprinkled with potholes that hugs the jungle covered Andes mountains, with jungle mountain rising steeply to one side and jungle mountain falling steeply to the other side. There is only room for one vehicle on the road at one time. How does your bus pass the on coming cars, 18 wheelers, and buses (that pass every 5 to 10 minutes)? Everyone once in a while there is an area cut out that is wide enough for two. The problem is when two trucks encounter each other head on and there is no cut out close by, its basically a sitting-chicken-fight with drivers hand signalling each other to see who is willing to back up to that last cut out. Backing an 18 wheeler or bus down this kind of road is no one's idea of a good time. Bus driver or passengers.
Now I wouldn't have soooooo much of a problem with this road if it was actually cut out of solid rock. That's the problem, is that it's not cut out of rock, its cut out of dirt. The type of dirt that causes so many washed out roads in Bolivia that its a national transportation problem. The type of dirt that causes land and mud slides. The type of dirt that if you put enough weight on it, for example a bus or an 18 wheeler, will give out. Solid rock doesn't slide or cause washed out roads when its wet. I like rock. Good thing its rainy season. FUCK.
We encountered several parts of the road that were washed out. This one particular part was the worst. It was a curve bending to the left that had been partially washed out. As we approached, a local was yelling that everyone should get out for safety reasons and walk across and let the bus cross alone. The bus paused in front of the curve, probably the driver debating what to do. Dave, Hannah and Brendan were sitting on the left side of the bus in the very back, looking down at the drop off. They said it dropped off at about a 75 degree slope for about 150-200 meters before dropping off more but to a lesser degree. They said it was not pretty and were quite worried. I stood up on my right side of the bus to try and see, it dropped off so fast I couldn't see the drop off, just open jungle down below. Like I said, the bus paused, then it started in. We made it part of the way around the curve before the whole bus banked down-back-left. Every ones heart on the bus was currently in stop-mode. Our back left tire was slipping into the washed out hole. The bus driver gunned it and we pulled out a second later. We would not have rolled off into the canyon, but we would have been well stuck into a water logged washed out road banking down into it. Not a nice sight. There was a lot of shouting and unhappy people on the bus after that, pretty much everyone was yelling at the bus driver that he is an incompetent idiot and should not have taken the curve with us on the bus. Now just imagine, other buses and 18 wheelers take this road all the time. Just a matter of time before one slips in. Not sure how often it happens, but I hear it happens often enough.
We had to get out of the bus during one section at about 2am in the morning. It's this huge muddy ramp section that the bus has to drive upwards. Again here the road was a bit washed out but not as bad and it was just more of a gentle downhill slope. It took the bus 30 minutes trying to get up this muddy section of about 75meters. We watched as it would back up, then gun it, banking wildly and sliding left and right trying to make it up this muddy slope. It wouldn't make it, so it would backup, some people would go throw rocks into certain spots of the mud and it would try again. Eventually it made it, we got on and it drove off. I wish I had a video to show how wildly this bus was banking and sliding.
Probably one of the funny parts was when this one bus tried to pass us. We backup in a turn area, so that the on coming traffic could take the inside part of the curve. The last four rows were behind the rear tire and they brought the rear tire almost to the edge of the road (incidentally this is where the Irish were sitting, Dave was looking out the window give us the play by play update), allowing the back 4 or so rows to hang over into the vast below. They would have backed the bus up further, but we hit something with a large thud and crack. Turns out there was a telephone pole over the cliff area to save road room. As the other bus passed, the drivers assistant ran out to see what happened in back, took a quickly look, bumper is still there, sweet, lets keep on going. WTF!?
Needless to say we got in late to Rurrenabaque. About 3 hours late, taking a total of 20hrs. Looking at the guidebook afterwards, we noticed a note in there: 'Most people that take the bus to Rurrenabaque decide to fly out instead of taking the bus due to traumatic experiences and safety.' True that. We bought our 65 USD plane ticket at our Pampas tour agency. We survived driving in, we were definitely flying out. The bus in, by the way, cost 8 USD.
