View from the bus, Street Vendors at every stop, More road
Monday, October 5, 1998
I awoke around 8 with a feeling of dread. Unless I could miraculously materialize an airplane from La Paz to Rurrenabaque, I was destined for a bus ride from hell. Anette, still asleep and probably dreaming of finally meeting up with her "future boyfriend" named Life from Norway in the afternoon, didn't hear me leave. (Sorry, Anette, I told you I wouldn't say anything, but I just couldn't help it...)
The few travel agencies I checked told me all I needed to know -- there are two ways to get to the Amazon Basin:
(1) 18 hour bus ride, "the roads are very bad".
(2) TAM, Transporte de Military -- a military plane you sorta hop a ride with... They have, in principle, one flight a week, Monday at 7:30 am. In practice, the flight rarely goes as scheduled and it was already Monday at 9 anyway.
So, it looks like a bus to me... I packed up my backpack, said goodbye to a clearly distracted Anette who was busy doing her hair (how many hours until you meet Life?), and then headed for the bus station on the outskirts of La Paz via taxi.
The taxi driver was very nice, and his 3 year old son Jacob was content on playing Power Rangers with me for the twenty minute ride. He was a little aggressive, though, and ended up bruising my lip with one really powerful "Bam!" to the head.
After saying "Ciao" to Jacob and father, I bought my ticket to Rurrenabaque for 55 soles (about $10). It was only noon, so I decided to buy some supplies. What do you buy for an 18 hour bus ride? Coke, Combos, Cheese, Crackers. I call them the "Essential C's". And extra batteries for the walkman, but that doesn't really start with a 'C' does it... After a brief lunch of chicken soup and a liter of Coke, it was back to the station to wait for the bus.
And wait. And wait. Our 1:30 departure, I was told, was delayed. Yeah, it's 3 now, I can see that... And wait. The liter of Coke from lunch caught up to me. I needed to pee. Unfortunately, there were no facilities at the bus depot. Indeed, no facilities at ANY of the surrounding buildings. I decided to hold it.
The more I wanted to hold it, the worse it got. Situation: Critical. After determining that the bus would indeed be delayed for another hour, I decided to go for a walk and find a bathroom...
A few blocks from the bus station, I was peering into a restaurant to determine if there was a bathroom when I guy in a blue jogging suit came running full speed up the block. Just as he passed me, he dropped a small paper bag from his jacket. A well-dressed "businessman" standing next to me bent down and picked it up. I went to the corner to look for the runner. No sign of him. Businessman, looking quite concerned, came to the corner, shrugged his shoulders and opened the bag in front of me. There was what seemed to be over $1000 in the bag. Oh my.
I looked at the guy and we both started walking in the direction the runner went. No sign of him anywhere. "You, me, Cincuenta, Cincuenta," he said as he pressed his finger against his lips in a shhhhing motion... 50/50 he wanted. He motioned for me to follow him.
We walked for a few blocks, and as we turned the corner onto the deserted Calle de El Dorado, we found the runner. And his 8" long switchblade. My 50/50 partner carefully removed my money belt from my waist, my computer bag from my back, and my nice watch from my wrist. It was a short-lived partnership. As the two men jumped into a car and drove away, I faced the prospect of life without a passport, money, credit cards. Not to mention the computer, watch, and camera. At least I wasn't hurt.
OK, OK, OK... That's not what happened... The runner did drop the money, the businessman did ask me to split it 50/50, but I had a really strange sense that something wasn't quite right about the situtation... Instead of following the businessman, I said "Bueno Suerta" (Good Luck) and headed back for the bus station as quickly as possible. Who knows what MIGHT have happened, but my travelers instinct said that Bolivians in jogging suits don't run down the street and accidently drop $1000 on the corner. What would you have done?
After all the excitement, I barely remembered my mission: to pee. I finally just decided to do what every Bolivian seems to do, which is go on the street. I did my best to find a quiet untrafficked spot where the runoff was unlikely to cause any harm. It definitely didn't feel quite right... Can you imagine just dropping trow and letting rip on the sidewalk in your home city??? Ah, the pleasures of the third-world. And I assure you, by the time I worked up enough courage, it was quite pleasurable.
Finally, at slight past 5, the bus arrived. A skull and crossbones and the world TERROR were painted in a sick green color on the back. A poster showing the bus, or one just like it, in various compromising positions -- hanging half off a ravine, stuck in mud, laying on one side -- was plastered to the side. Is that supposed to be reassuring? Faced with such prospects, is it better to sit in the front of the bus near the exit but also near the impact zone, or in the back further from the exit but further from impact? Such are the decisions you're faced with in Bolivia.
I decided to sit in back where I was happy to see that I had three whole seats to myself -- almost unheard of in third world transport. I turned on the walkman and settled into Cientos Siete -- 107 FM and a selection of Spin Doctors, Tori Amos, Billy Joel.
A few hours outside of La Paz, the bus stopped abruptly. We all exited and found a dozen or so armed military personnel waiting for us. We were searched, our bags prodded and sniffed by the drug dogs. Cocaine is big business in Bolivia, perhaps it's leading export.
The checkpoint signaled the start of our descent. The road from La Paz to Coichiana drops over 3 kilometers in 80 kilometers of nerve-racking narrow dirt road. I didn't know this at the time, but National Geographic did a story on this road and named it the most dangerous in the world...
It was dark. It was foggy. A slippery drizzle misted the road. The driver, the nearest living relative of Mario Andretti, was starting 4 hours behind schedule. After a few corners of sheer terror, I threw a 1 Boliviano coin out the window over the 2000m cliff a mere 6 inches from the rear tire. I wished for safe passage.
My prayers were answered. Our bus came screaming (2 wheels?) around a corner and was reined in by a much slower moving brand new Range Rover. We followed closely behind for a while, and then much to the surprise of the Range Rover, we overtook him around a hairpin corner and left him in the dust. As the only Gringo on the bus, I had to look toward my Bolivian co-riders for moral support. They looked totally unconcerned.
After the most precipitous of the downhill sections, I did my best to sleep. But, taking all precautions, I locked my computer bag to my belt buckle and tucked in my shirt over my money belt. Sleeping is not a comfortable proposition in such circumstances, but it's better than getting robbed.
Tuesday, October 6, 1998
Around 1:30, I was quite startled. A uniformed guard shook me and motioned for me to step outside. It took a few minutes to get my bearings, and the officer became agitated. Another drug check. This time, my bag was searched inside and out and after the patting down I recieved, I know Officer Urranga so well that I think I'll send him a Christmas card.
At 7, the bus rolled into the station in Rurrenabaque -- on schedule, despite a 3 hour late start.
After getting my bag, I looked around for a taxi. No cars anywhere in sight. Instead, there were about 20 mopeds and motorcycles. It didn't take me long to figure out the preffered mode of public transport in Rurrenabaque. So, I strapped on my backpack and jumped on the back of a Honda 150 -- "Despacio, por favor", I begged, right before my driver popped a little wheelie and sped me off to a hotel in the center of town.
I collapsed in a somewhat reasonable room and slept for most of the day. I made time later in the afternoon for researching companies selling tours of the pampas (swamp) and selva (jungle). Amazonia Adventures had just what I was looking for -- a three day tour of Amazon swamp land...