Stacking it on the World´s Most Dangerous Road

Whoever decided to promote the WMDR as a tourist attraction is either a marketing genius or a complete idiot. Probably both.

Here are the stats: up to 200 people a year die on this road, in the rainy season a vehicle goes off the road on average once every two weeks. Which wouldn´t be much of a problem if there wasn´t a 500 - 900m sheer drop down the mountain and no barrier to hold you in. Basically if you go over the side, you´re toast.

What the stats don´t say is that it is also one of the world´s most beautiful roads, and brilliant for mountain biking.

So, I decided it would be a good idea to cycle down it. Here is a typical conversation.
-"Is it a dangerous tour?"
-"No"
-"But isn´t it the world´s most dangerous road?"
-"Yes! But its not dangerous for cycling, only for buses"
-"How do we get back to La Paz?"
-"By bus! You are insured by the way? Are you sure, can you check your medical insurance?"

Hmmm. I wasn´t put off though, and I soon realised its safe to go down, as long as you listen carefully to the guides advice, and don´t make any mistakes.

We started off at 4000m, and although I had 6 layers of clothing on, 2 pairs of gloves and a woolley hat beneath my helmet, I was still freezing. We all checked our bikes, paying particular attention to the brakes, then had a drink and paid homage to the earth goddess Pachamama, to ask her for a safe ride.

The first 20k of the road was bloody fantastic. It was a hard paved surface, and we got up some serious speed on the steep slopes. The front guide knew how fast to take the corners, so we all followed suit, overtaking cars and lorries along the way. It was such an adrenaline rush.

Those 20k seemed to last about 5 minutes, until we reached the 40k of the WMDR. I´ll describe this road: it is a rough track, about the width of 1 lorry, which is useful as lorries frequently use it. In fact we only saw big lorries, buses crowded with people and the odd jeap, a normal car would have never got down the road. There is plenty of traffic, in both directions which makes for interesting head to head traffic jams, with about 4 vehicles in each direction, and one line having to reverse back. Everywhere in Bolivia drives on the right hand side, except for this particular road where the rules are reversed. This is because vehicles driving up the road cling to the mountainside, forcing anyone (including us) to pass on the left. Which would be fine, if it wasn´t for that 500-900m drop I mentioned earlier.

If all this wasn´t bad enough, the road was rocky, muddy and slippy. We even rode through waterfalls and rivers during our descent. Needless to say we got soaking wet and covered in mud. The road is almost perfect for mountain biking, if we didn´t have to keep stopping to let the traffic past.

I´m quite proud of the fact that, out of 20 or so cyclists, I was the only one to fall off. It was at a point where the goggles, that I had to wear to keep the mud and grit out of my eyes, were caked in mud and I could only see about a metre ahead of me. I had stopped to wipe them a few times, but 2 minutes later they were full of mud again so it was pointless. Then suddenly, a stone about the size of a house brick was at my front wheel, and I had no time to avoid it. As I hit the brick, me and my bike went flying, thankfully into the middle of the road, and not to the side and over the edge. I escaped with aggravating my old shoulder injury, big bruises and a swollen leg, but luckily nothing too serious. I had many admirers that day, because everyone thought I was really ´hard´for continuing to cycle after the accident. Everyone insisted on inspecting my leg, with lots of ´ooh´and ´ahh´ing noises, which I had more fun with when I showed people my two big black toe-nails, which I got during the Colca Canyon trek, and which show no signs of recovering.

p.s. since writing this, my shoulder is really hurting and my leg has come up nicely purple and black, and hurts a lot more, but I´m still off to do a 4 day trek tomorrow...