Despite the spotty electricity and running water, we were grateful to have a roof over our heads and heavy blankets under which to sleep! It was a glorious sleep and when we awoke we found everything outside to be covered with a decent blanket of snow. Our bikes were quite a sight! We unpacked our own stoves and slurped down oatmeal and tea for breakfast, packed up, and headed out to the bikes to see what kind of starting shape…
Linus woke up before the sun and hiked above our campsite to watch it rise. He felt that it was truly one of the most special experiences he’s had. It was quiet, bitterly cold and crystal clear. There was new snow on the mountains and frost on everything. He felt so small in such a giant landscape so high up in the altiplano! It had been so cold all night that everyone’s sleeping gear was covered in condensation from our…
We woke up with the sun and when we crawled out of our tents, we found that during the night it had snowed in the mountains above us! It was so pretty! We got packed up an eventually got around to discussing what to do about the road ahead. There were a few questions floating around. Was this really the Lagunas Route? What about the other road about 30k down the road? Maybe that was the actual way to go?…
To the Lagunas Route! You might be wondering what this is all about, so I will fill you in. The Lagunas route is a series of very small roads (and sometimes no road at all) that only four wheel drive vehicles and motorcycles such as ours (ones that can handle off road conditions) take. It travels through the high desert and mountains of southern Bolivia and passes a series of salt lakes along the way. I hear there are pink…
We spent most of the day Sunday cleaning up the aftermath from the salt desert. Even though we were only out there for a few hours, the bikes were covered in salt! It didn’t help that Linus and I accidentally rode our bikes through a puddle of salt water that ended up being more like a lake. It was deep! We took the seats and tanks off of our bikes and set to work cleaning and checking everything. We used…
It was finally time to go ride on the Bolivian salt flats! Although it is rain season and part of the salt flats are covered with water, we had heard from people on the road that a bit further out it is dry and firm. And so we left our heavy luggage at the hostel and took off with unburdened bikes for a day of epic riding! About halfway out of town Rich managed to ride over an enormous nail…
One of my favorite things about camping is waking up with the sun. For some reason in this situation, I am immune to my usual resistance to waking up early. Despite the intensely noisy wind all night, I felt pretty well rested. It was so nice to wake up next to the river! We had a simple breakfast of coffee and bread with peanut butter. My stomach had woken me up a few times in the night and it still…
Written by Linus, posted by Lise: Time to hunt for tires again, this time in the desert city of Oruro. Me, Drew, Rich and Sam went for a morning hunt for breakfast and tires while Lise got some well deserved rest and yoghurt stomach therapy in the hotel room. Sam had found an address for what we now generally call moto street, the street with all the motorcycle repair and parts shop, so we strolled out in that direction. Once…
We woke up early to exit the saggy bed of death. It was seriously the softest, saggiest mattress I have ever encountered, our bums nearly touched the floor under the bed! We enjoyed a breakfast of oatmeal and coffee utilizing our camp stove and then packed up and headed down the street to attempt to re-seat Drew’s tire from his roadside flat fix the day before as it was riding a little rough. We found a little tire shop that…
This one is written by Linus and posted by Lis: We woke up in the dirty swimming pool courtyard to the sound of jungle birds singing strange songs. It had rained a bit during the night but as we had set our tents under the roofed area we were still fairly dry. We cooked some quick breakfast coffee on the stoves and packed our bikes, eager to get out of this place and get on with our dirt road mission….