Hi Folks,

Linda here. Just wanted to update you on what´s been happening, and give you my own account of the last few days.

We arrived in La Paz after a very long (12 hour) overnight bus journey on the coldest bus in the world. It was soooo cold that nobody could feel their feet, hands, legs etc even after we arrived at our hotel (at 5am!) and had all gone to bed for a few hours. Nobody really thawed out til after hot showers later in the day...brrrr. We though we had it bad, but there were even people lying down in the aisle that didn´t even have the luxury of a seat. Don´t ever want to experience that again, might as well have slept in a fridge for 12 hours. Yuk!

Anyway, various people had told us that La Paz is awful, and that we should aim to leave quickly. However, even tho I´m not really a city person, LP was a great place - full of colour, sights, sounds, smells etc and is pretty safe too, as long as you´re not being driven somewhere - then you really do take your life in your hands. LP was where our time with our Kumuka group ended, after a really diverse and incredible 2 weeks that are a major highlight of our travels.

However, our last trip together has to be one of the all time top highlights. How do you fancy riding on a mountain bike from La Cumbre (4640m) to Coroico, a 3345m vertical decent down The Death Road (mostly a dirt road, but with some fast 60kph tarmac at the top). More than 64km of pure Downhill Madness on a super fast mountain bike. From altiplano to the jungle on a glorious day, with amazing scenery and landscape changes. Yipppeeeeeee. And no, I didn´t tell my Mum I was planning to do it...best to keep it quiet til after the event (a bit like the first time I went parachuting al those years ago!!)

Anyway, back to the biking..... We were given excellent bikes with suspension/shock absorbers and really great guides. How can I describe whizzing downhill at the edge of the Andes mountain range, with 100m to 500m drops right by the side of us? What can I say about overtaking lorries, cars and trucks en masse as we hurtled down the road, with hairpin bends, potholes, lots of others cyclists etc etc. One section was uphill for 4km, and it would of course be at the point where we hit cloud cover, thus meaning that we had almost zero visibility and very wet muddy conditions. All this was happening at about 3000 feet above sea level at that point, so the uphill part was definitely great fitness training. I was a bit miffed though that I couldn´t get my gears to work for the first couple of minutes, and so lost a lot of ground and momentum uphill..... oh well, just had to work even harder to get up there!

Once we got to the top of the uphill stretches, we were rewarded to the final 30km on dirt track (after very welcome snacks), even more on the edge of the precipice than we´d be on the "new" stretch of road. I was in one of the fastest groups and have to admit that it was scary at times to find myself looking towards the edge at the view, only to realise that my bike was following suit!! Quick correction required and a firm grip on the brakes! We stopped at various points where crosses marked the "departure" of various cyclists, buses, cars etc, as the guides explained what had happene dto them. It was only up until last year that heavy traffic used the road, which was the cause of many casulaties/fatalities......however, they still happen, but thankfully not to the same level as previously.

Onece we descended down through the cloud cover my fingers and toes started to thaw out a bit, I started to dry out a bit and feeling began to return to my legs. It was then that we were treated with the most stuning views of waterfalls, lush green forested Andean peaks, tiny settlements, awesome drop-off views etc as we hurtled down and round over incredibly bumpy and gritty roads. There were punctures, problems with gears, and sadly one of our fellow Kumuka group fell off his bike near the end of the route. Thankfully he wasn´t seriously hurt, and fell onto the track rather than over the edge - guaranteed to really shake you up!

Even before Mike fell off, it was weird to be reminded regularly that not a lot separated any of us from death, because it would be very easy to lose control/concentration/ get a puncture/ collide with another rider or a lorry etc etc and disappear over the edge of the narrow and precarious track. It´s no wonder that we had to sign such a big waiver/disclaimer before we started! It was one of the most incredible things I´ve ever done, and was fantastic to be out there all day, having fun and getting the adrenaline pumping. At the end, there was a very welcome bottle of beer and a lot of celebrating as a group. We were then taken to a hotel for showers, swim and buffet dinner before heading back to LP, and boy did we enjoy it.

Having survived the bike ride, it´s fair to say that the madness continued on the mini bus journey back. Our driver thought nothing of overtaking vehicles up hill on blind bends, and traffic coming the other way happily did the same. Bearing in mind that we returned largely by the same route we took, with sheer drops and narrow twisty roads - and this time in the dark - it was a very scary experience and almost more adrenaline loaded than the bike ride itself!

Thankfully, we all got back in one piece, and it was a really fantastic day out, although my trainers were sooooo wet and muddy by the end I had to come back with bare feet, because they were too disguiting to put back on....and there was plenty of laundry to put in too. We were given a DVD and T shirt as part of the day, so hopefully we´ll get some photos on flickr soon, as evidence. Fantastic. Awesome, right up there and totally recommended to anyone. WOW!

The next morning (yesterday) we had a much more sedate trip - a city tour. We go to see lots of different aspects and locations of LP, some great views and we even bumped into a friend from our stay in Santiago who was sitting on the Cathedral steps. Our guide was very knowledgeable and helpful, so a great morning was had there too. A bit of shopping, eating and socializing brough us to the end of our last day in LP, leaving at 8am this mornig for our 4 hour bus journey.

Here we are now soaking up the relaxed atmosphere in Copacabana, a very small and laid back little toown on the edge of Lake Titicaca. It´s very weird to see a beach and pedaloes for hire in Bolivia, a land-locked country, but this is thanks to the lake, a vast interior expanse of water (the highest in the world, I believe). Maybe we´ll go to the other extreme of adrenaline rush activities and hire a swan shaped pedalo tomorrow? - a land of contrasts and extremes.

Anyway, look out for some photos soon on Flickr, and thanks for following our travels around the world. No bones broken, all intact and happy, and about to go off for dinner at the lovely hotel where we´re staying with 2 of our Kumuka friends who are also here at the same time......it´s a hard life.

Hope you´re all well and enjoying life. Do leave your comments if you get a chance, it´s great to read them.

Bye for now,

love from Linda xxx ;-)