Getting out of La Paz

October 10, 2023

We were a little anxious cycling out of the chaotic city La Paz and, even worse, El Alto on top of the ridge. It turned out the first stage could not be easier using the teleférico! What a pleasure being lifted out of the city including our bikes with no effort at all :) El Alto was a different story... Men, if you didn't go into the jungle yet you get plenty cycling out here. Going out was even more challenging than going in. Best strategy, take part in the traffic and act like a minivan. It took us about an hour of waving and worming through tiny passages in between rows of cars, but we got out! Yet again a not-to-miss bikepacking experience. We are ticking all the boxes out here ;)

The following section to the famous Uyuni Salt Flat of Bolivia, we made sport out of clocking kilometers. As many as possible without blowing ourselves up. You see, given our time schedule we opted for the fast route, involving stretches of highway. Beautiful scenery at times, but overall not the most romantic so we figured, might as well look for a different challenge :) Current record stands at 122 km in 6 hours including, yes we finally got it, fixing not one but two flats in a row...

Upon entering Oruro we faced a rather big road block. A lot of people on the road with sticks. Cars took a detour. Jaap saw a small opening to slide through and thought, whatever, we can fit through that... There are people on the road in SA all over the place. They did not seem too angry. Little did we know. A lot of yelling, woohing, shouting and a small slap with a stick to Jaap's panniers resulted. But if you go, better to go with confidents than with hesitation. Jaap yelled along with the crowd and off we went. Later we learned that not interfering is the best strategy. But hey, ignorance is bless...

All freshed-up we again hit the road for a couple of 100K days on to the next stop, Salar de Uyuni!

Route: La Paz - Tolar - Oruro - Challapata