Trip Report Eleven: Welcome To
The Jungle
May 17 - May 25, 2001
May 17 - The ride away from Coroico is
spectacular -- comparable to the 'most dangerous road in the world'
ride to Coroico that I made two days previously. For much of today´s
ride, I again have a narrow highway with precipitous drop to the river
on the left. As with the 'most dangerous road', today´s ride is also
fast and mostly downhill. A heavy early afternoon rain storm enhances
the day´s adventure because the road turns to mud. I officially obtain
my dirtiest status since the beginning of the trip -- legs, face, and
arms are a mask of mud. As I pass through the occasional roadside community,
adults and children laugh at my appearance and dogs refuse to chase
me. Not long after the rain stops, I reach the road junction town of
Caranavi. Though still more than 3000 kilometers from the Atlantic (as
the river flows), the elevation is only 300 meters. I branch north from
Caranavi and continue cycling towards the Mapiri River port town of
Guanay which is 80 kilometers distant. En route to Guanay, I pause to
chat with a campesino who is wrestling a 2.5 meter long boa that he
just pulled out of his garden. He offers to put it around my neck for
a photo opportunity, but I decline. I take a picture of him holding
the snake, but leave before I am forced to witness snake´s death. Dusk
catches me 40 kilometers from Guanay and I hop aboard motorized transportation
so that I am assured of arriving at the port town for the next morning
river departure to Rurrenabaque. I am taking the river transport to
Rurre because the alternative road route is indirect and takes three
days on bicycle -- much more painful than a relaxing one-day river cruise.
Total distance biked 120 kilometers.
May 18 - River transport from Guanay to
Rurrenabaque occurs infrequently enough (once or twice a week) that
I do NOT want to miss the group of foreigners who are currently congregating
in Guanay to hire a canoe. I know that there is a group of foreigners
congregating here because we conceived the plan while together in Coroico.
We all meet at 8:00 AM at the river port and commence price haggling
with the boat owner for the better part of an hour. Finally, the sixteen
of us board the motorized 40-foot-long dugout. With the exception of
two pilots and two Bolvians who are to be dropped mid-way, the rest
are foreigners, all of them as pale and ugly as me. The travelers I
chat with on the boat are an interesting bunch - self-proclaimed global
wanderers, people with one to twelve months free to explore the world.
When I ask a Swiss backbacker where he hails from, he asks me if I mean
this current year. Very cute. In addition to the self-important Swiss,
our boat contains the typical loud-talking Aussies, a couple of French
girls who are surprisingly down-to-earth, a characteristically friendly
British couple that needs every little word translated for them, the
mandatory Germans who despise American foreign policy (and Americans
too), and a generic, long-haired Irish transcendental healer who works
in a spiritual center in Brazil. As the sole cyclist and sole American,
I am pleased to observe that most of my countryfolk are content to stay
at home where they can't do too much cultural damage. Though the group
atmosphere is fun for me at first, I am fed up and tired with the traveler
scene after about five hours on the river. It seems as though everyone
is complaining about something... about the transportation price, about
the heat, about the bugs, about the slow pace of travel, and about the
pilot's negligence in letting us know that there is no lunch stop en
route. I too am not without a gripe, but it is directed at myself. I
neglected to bring cold beer from Guanay for the comfy cruise. En route,
I spy several capybaras along the ride and imagine how much fun it would
be to see them while drinking a beer.
May 19 - Rurre is absolutely overrun by
backpackers and I can't wait to get away. They all congregate in this
river port town because it is a good place to organize a group of gringos
for a tour to the nearby jungle or pampas (flatland swamps with lots
of wildlife). I buy a couple of groceries, a new rear tire, and a battery
for my Cateye cyclocomputer. The instrument thankfully revives. The
ride from Rurre to the Brazilian border involves more than 700 kilometers
of flatness and extreme remoteness which would be hell without an odomoter.
The route is mostly through pampa (semi-forested swampy areas) and promises
to be both interesting and logistically challenging. There is a 350
kilometer stretch which is completely devoid of towns. I am a little
intimidated to do the trip by myself, but am also excited at the prospect,
and eager to get underway. Despite a one PM departure, I force myself
to do the entire 105 kilometer ride to the town of Santa Rosa today.
The scenery and birdlife is incomparable in the open pampa. I cover
the last 10 kilometers to Santa Rosa in pitch black, beneath a sparkling
sky, accompanied by a raucous chorus from bug-feasting birds. Most of
the time I am thinking how lucky I am to have this experience. I repeatedly
remind myself that I am crossing a part of the Amazon Basin by bicycle.
How cool is that? In my head I´ve got Guns & Roses ´Welcome to the Jungle´
going on at full volume... except that I substitute pampa for jungle.
I am thinking that I am a pretty cool guy until I hit an unseen pothole
(it is dark after all) and go over my handlebars and into the puddle.
Now I bike more slowly and don`t sing my smug song anymore. I get to
Santa Rose two hours after dark and ask a couple of well-dressed blokes,
Mario and Jorge, where I should consider spending the night. They take
me to clean, but cockroach-infested hotel with 24-hour running water!
They also promise to come by a couple hours later for some beers and
a night on the town -- it is saturday after all. We meet after my shower,
drink a mess of beer (I am not allowed to buy), and do some dancing
at one of the town`s several discos. The music is a pleasant mix of
polka and cumbia and I believe that I can dance it just fine. Before
I get too carried away, my new friends warn me that I must be VERY careful
not to dance with anyone else's girl here in Santa Rosa. More than a
few Bolivians have lost their lives in this town in gun duels after
breaking this golden rule. I return to my hotel at three in the morning
to find a couple of cows in the courtyard blocking access to the toilet.
May 20 - I decide not to leave Santa Rosa
today because Maurizio has the day off from his vetenary work and he
suggests that we go fishing at a nearby river. I am not able to catch
anything, but the little 10-year-old punk next to me pulls out five
blanco and three piranha in less than an hour. We buy the fish off the
kid, claim that they are ours, and retreat to the riverside bar for
a couple of beers. We share a table with the Bolvian bodybuilding champion
(a Sylvester Stallone look-alike) who just happens to be visiting his
mother in Santa Rosa for mother´s day. Later we eat dinner at Maurizio´s
family´s house. Duck is on the menu but we have to kill it first. I
give the duck-killing thing a go (a duck has no claws, so why not),
but I can´t seem to break the neck sufficiently. Maurizio puts the poor
duck out of its misery with a deft snap (it turns out you have to use
your knee as a lever) and the bird flops around for five minutes before
it is pluckable. We eat delicious duck soup for dinner (locro de pato)
followed by a desert of fresh grapefruit. The grapefruit are from the
tree in the garden and thus begins my love affair with Bolivian grapefruit.
May 21 - I fully intend to beat the day´s
heat by getting up at 6:00 AM, but I oversleep until 10:00 AM. Its already
over 90 degrees farenheit when I start on my way north. At first the
road is horrific with a mostly dry but uneven surface that keeps my
speed under 13 kilometers per hour. The deep ruts in the road attest
to the stuck vehicles from the previous month(s). During the rainy season
here in Beni Province, it often takes vehicles a full week to get from
Riberalta to La Paz. When it is dry, vehicles can complete the route
is less than 36 hours! I find only one active vehicle snare located
about 40 kilometers north of Santa Rosa. A truck is stuck in a mucky
wallow that is over two meters deep. The passengers have been patiently
waiting six hours for assistance. I am barely able to pass by, walking
my bike through sticky, knee-deep mud. The road improves dramatically
soon after the stuck truck and becomes an earthy red gravel. I am able
to keep my speed consistently at 25 kilometers per hour. Everything
is progressing fine until I break my first spoke of the trip. Needless
to say, it is a rear spoke on the cogset side of the wheel. Since I
have no means of removing the cogset, I spend well over an hour snaking
a replacement spoke into the wheel. After the repair, dusk is encroaching
quickly and I am eager to reach the next (and last) village for the
next 400 kilometers of my route. As I speed down the gravel road, I
try to avoid anything resembling a stick lying in the road because two
sticks have already slithered away as I passed them by. In the gathering
gloom, I notice a very large stick, actually more like a 3-meter-long
log, to which I grant a respectful berth. Good thing as I notice that
the log is also moving. I retreat to a significant distance to take
pictures of the gator. From here on out, I reduce my speed dramatically.
I reach Puerto Yata in the last few moments of daylight and suffer through
hordes of mosquitoes until the ferry finally arrives to take me across
the 50-meter-wide River Yata. I help the ferry workers with the crossing
as it requires some manual labor -- we haul the ferry tug-of-war style
across the river. Puerto Yata is a tiny truck stop but it is fortunately
large enough to have a couple beds for rent. I settle on a building
that also has a cafeteria and a small general store. As I approach the
counter, I notice that the propieter, a friendly woman named Fabiola,
is applying Selson Blue to her forearms and legs. Though embarassed,
she is relieved to discover that her ´bug repelent´ is really an anti-dandruff
shampoo. She says that she was wondering why it was so soapy and why
it didn't seem to deter any bugs. Total distance biked 90 kilometers.
Total grapefruit consumed five.
May 22 - Today I get an early start but
it is all for naught. My bob trailer tire bursts tweny kilometers from
Puerto Yata. I patch it, but it bursts again. The rubber tire tread
is in very bad shape. Patches on the inside of the tire enable me to
proceed another 10 kilometers, but it is a losing battle. I finally
take dramatic measures and fill the bob trailer tire with grass. After
ten more kilometers the grass has all clumped at one side of the wheel.
I add more grass three seperate times. The wheel has the misleading
appearance of roundness, but it is less efficient than I had hoped for.
My maximum speed is only about 17 kilometers per hour. And this is a
good road with no wind! Just as I am starting to lose faith, another
rear wheel cog-set-side spoke snaps. I replace this spoke again and
straighten the wheel as best I can, but I decide that it is in my best
interest to get to Riberalta for some real repairs. A kilometer further
down the road I encounter a family of pig farmers who are waiting for
a ride to Riberalta and I decide to join them. They have been waiting
for three days, but I figure that I may have better luck because I am
not transporting five full-grown pigs. It is two in the afternoon and
only one northbound vehicle has passed today, so I sit by the side of
the road with Roberto and Adella and their son Tesoro until the next
vehicle passes by. It turns out we have lots of time to talk. Roberto
and Adella, like most sensible Bolivians, want to know why in the world
I am cycling across their country. Because I am tired of my token responses
- 'to meet people', 'to experience the culture', 'to view the scenery',
I tell these kind people the real truth... I am actually biking across
South America because I enjoy suffering. Adella immediately brightens
at my response and asks me if I am the son of god or if I merely walk
with the lord. Though it is tempting, I do not pretend I am Jesus. And
because I have no desire to open a nasty can of worms by telling Adella
that I am a die-hard, born-again atheist, I respond to her that I merely
'walk with god.' Adella is contented but only for a little while. A
couple of hours later she spots me immersed in my paperback. She walks
over to me, bible in hand, and suggests that I should read something
of value. She says it is a waste of time to fill my head with written
words from inferior books. She quotes several passages to support her
argument. I listen patiently for a little while, but finally I tell
her the horrific news that I am a scientist. I add furthermore that
I firmly believe that my father´s father´s father was a monkey. Adella
gasps in disbelief and our ensuing conversation deals with evolution,
plate tectonics, war in the holy lands, sex education, and Buddhism.
I eventually suggest to Adella and Roberto that the most important thing
is to keep an open mind and to always be respectful of people who have
a different faith (or no faith at all). Roberto is a jovial fellow who
nods his head in approval, but Adella is unconvinced and resorts to
pulling out the big guns. She asks me to scientifically explain how
it is that her son Tesoro was once dead as a doornail, stiff as a board,
and woke up only after she invoked Jesus. With this final argument,
she wins our unwinnable debate. As it is already dark and no vehicle
will stop in Beni after nightfall, I am invited inside to join the pig
farmers for dinner. A cousin and the cousin´s wife and children show
up and we dine on fried fish (blanco), rice, and yucca. The conversation
mercifully changes from religion to dangerous animals and the men show
me their scars and tell me their poisonous snake bite war stories. I
set up my tent inside the thatched-roof house and sleep nearby my newfound
friends. Total distance biked 80 kilometers.
May 23 - Five trucks and one bus pass
between 8 and 10 AM, but none of them stop for me or my friends or their
pigs. It is 250 kilometers of uninhabited pampa north to Riberalta and
only 80 kilometers of uninhabited pampa backwards to Puerto Yata. Without
repairs, I know that my bike will not survive 250 klicks. So as painful
as it is, I turn south and retrace my tracks. Five hours later, I am
back in Fabiola's restaurant chugging two liters of ice-cold sprite.
In her porch the shaded thermometer reads 38 degrees Celsius (100 Farenheit).
The humidity is oppressive. I pass the afternoon swimming in the river
and waiting for transport. Eventually a truck pulls into Yata at about
5 PM and offers me passage. The open cargo hold is filled with more
than 30,000 bricks and a couple dozen putrid leather carcasses, but
I am not picky. I lay my foam mattress atop the bricks and settle down
for the 12-hour ride to Riberalta. It is a beautiful night full of stars
and I quickly fall asleep, lulled by the clicking and crashing of bricks
as the truck avoids potholes. Hallucinatory Lariam (malaria medicine)
dreams kick into full force tonight with vampire bats as the primary
theme of my nightmares. Rabid vampire bats are common in Beni Province
and my dreams reflect the stories I have heard about these animals chomping
the exposed toes of unwary campers. My ankles are bare and I repeatedly
wake up in horror as my stupid Sprite bottle (loose in the truck´s cargo
hold) repeatedly crashes into my legs. Each time I imagine that my blood
is nourishing a pair of bloodthirsty, snarling, ravenous bats. Total
distance biked (backwards to Yata) 80 kilometers.
May 24 - Riberalta is a bustling metropolis
of 60,000 people and after the previous week in the sticks, it sure
seems big to me. Upon my arrival in the Plaza de Armas, I am immediately
cornered by a couple of photographers from Riberalta Channel 7. They
want to know where I am coming from and why I look so dirty. I briefly
tell them my story and the interview airs during the local lunchtime
news hour. After lunch, I do my bike fixing errands and repeatly run
into people who have seen me on the television. Throughout the day,
people wave at me or stop to chat. I am truly a famous figure. At the
hardware store where I find a 16-inch bob-trailer replacement tire,
they tell me that my money is useless. Captain Edwin Guzman, the owner
of the store, tells me that my journey is an inspiration for all the
young people of Bolivia. Despite my protests, he insists upon giving
me the tire. Later I am at Carlos´s bike repair, seeking help to remove
my cogset and replace my damaged spokes. Carlos won´t let me do the
job. He replaces my spokes and trues my wheel for me and he won't accept
money for the spokes or the work. Later in the evening, when I try to
pay my dinner bill, the owner of the restaurant gives me a 50 percent
discount.
May 25 - My popularity in Riberalta has
gone to my head. I realize that my celebrity will destroy me if I don't
leave immediately. My bike is in tip-top shape and I jet off to the
east towards Guayaramerin and the Brazilian border. Today is my last
long day of unpaved road and I expect a good workout. Amazingly, the
road is in fantastic shape, hard-packed and mostly flat, with zero wind.
Cloud cover keeps the temperatures to the mid-eighties and I am able
to cruise. It takes me only 4.5 hours to reach Guayaramerin including
rest stops and one ferry-boat crossing. I arrive in the town plaza and
look across the Mamore River to Brazil. Tomorrow I will have to try
to converse with the people there and they talk Portugese. Total distance
biked 97 kilometers.
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