kleton

Hey folks!

Back with some new interesting stories. A bit hung over at the moment, we went to a club called Traffic in La Paz, gonzo was supposed to play...but he never turned up. We had a good time anyways, good vibe, good pumping beats, cheap white russians.

We bumped into this guy who tried to sell us coke, he was from south africa and had been in jail in Brasil for 5 years. He was a sad soul, and he couldn´t go home he said. None of his stories made sense, he said he´d been awake for 72 hours...so maybe that played a part. We did not buy any coke by the way, I told him I thought it was a pretty destructive drug...he didn´t listen.

So, what else have we been up to? A few days ago we set off for El Alto which is the area situated on a plateu 4000m above sea level to visit a market. I came back with a guitar, so I´m well pleased now that I can play all the time. Victor also bought himself a guitar.

Kolbjorn bought an enormous drum and went down beating it along the streets of La Paz. People were sort of staring at us. The taxi driver got a bit annoyed with the drum and eventually told him to stop.

El Alto market, La Paz in the background. BAÑO PUBLICO means public toilets, I think that toilet must be one of the worst on planet earth. If you gotta go, you gotta go...

Me and Victor with La Paz in the background.

The last thing we did in La Paz before heading back down to Calacoto was buying tickets for death road mountainbiking.

The next morning we left home at 6am to head up to La Paz again to join the rest of the grooup at 7am for breakfast, then we were handed clothes, helmet, gloves and got into minibuses and headed up into the mountains.

My head started spinning again when we got out at 4.700m, clouds were sweeping across the road, it was like a twilight zone. But the good news was that the first section of the trip was tarmac road, down hill.

It was amazing the speed we went down, I felt a rush of joy, it was amazing. I´ve been looking forward to this for so long!

Kalbjorn at 4700m above sea level.

We kept stopping to gather the group, everyone weren´t that fast. I was ofcourse straight behind the guide nicknamed "speedy gonzales", he was impossible to keep up with. This dude from Argentina was really annoying, he acted like he was 6 years old all the time, throwing rocks off cliffs and stuff.

The next part of the road is more rought and dangerous, you really had to concentrate on the rocky roads and the vertical drops of up to 600m without any railings. We passed loads of crosses where people had lost their lives. It was really wierd.

One of the cliffs you didn´t want to make a wrong turn at.

Eventually me, Victor and Kalbjorn decided to go slower to enjoy the beautiful surroundings. The tempurature started getting hotter and hotter.

Me looking really pleased. I was really pleased, I´d been looking forward to this for so long!

This I didn´t expect to see coming going up death road. An ex-swedish truck from Olles Akeri. Cool.

Eventually we were down in the tropics, it was like 35 celcius and we were trying to avoid hitting mangos that had fallen on to the road.

When we finally got down to Coroico I was roasting, we had shell suits on us so it was literally baking. We had ridden through waterfalls to, so the clothes were a bit damp and the air really humid.

Releived to let my jeans down and feel a bit of fresh air again.

So after 80kms of downhill mountainbiking we felt we needed more adventure before having our meal. The others went to swim in a swimming pool with green slimey water, but we could hear a rushing river behind the jungle.

We hacked our way through it, and fell down slopes and got covered in sticky green things from some plant. Finally we made it to the river, and took all clothes of and went for a refreshing dip. It was a bliss to get rid of the sweat and cool down. The currants in the water were pretty strong, so you had to be careful. I risked dropping my camera climbing out onto a tree that had fallen into the river to take pictures.

Bathing in paradise.

Bliss!

Later we had some food, talked to some other swedes, got bitten by bugs, got into the minibus and went back home.

No Victor has asked me three times to go and eat Salteñes, I´ve hogged the computer for hours now...

Gonzos birthday tomorrow, so having some dinner. Later thisafternoon were headning up some mountain where some activities are taking place. What on earth that means I do not know...

Adios!