“Have you ever made this ride, Captain?” asked the sergeant, removing his cap and running his fingers through his thick, gray crew cut.
“No I haven’t, Sergeant, but it couldn’t be any worse than the flight over.”
“Well, you are in for a treat, Sir. For starters, it is the only road in Bolivia where you drive on the left. You’ll soon see why. But, I do hope it clears up so you can enjoy the scenery and I can calm my nerves.”
The term “road” was an exaggeration. It should have been more properly called a ledge, a shelf carved out of the sides of a mountain with a vertical wall lost in the clouds on one side and a 2,000-foot sheer drop on the other. Although this path allowed two-way traffic, its width never exceeded ten feet, and there were no guard rails on the cliff side, only small crosses planted at spots marking fatal accidents. The aptly called “Road of Death” ran for approximately 45 miles from La Paz to Coroico, in the Yungas region, and took four hours to navigate. It had been named the world’s most dangerous road by some international travel organization which claimed the road accounted for between 200 and 300 travelers’ deaths a year. Of course, I did not have this information at the time; I looked it up after miraculously surviving the trip and revising my mental note to switch back to air travel in the future.
The initial stretch from La Paz to La Cumbre Pass, at an altitude of about 15,500 feet, was uneventful. Although the fog was thick and the road was wet and slippery, traffic coming into La Paz was light at that early hour and, besides, we were climbing uphill. The uphill driver always had the right of way, meaning that if two vehicles coming in opposite directions did not have room to pass each other, it was up to the downhill driver to back up to a wider stretch of road or otherwise inch over to the edge of the 2,000-foot cliff to make room for the uphill vehicle.
Once we reached our pinnacle and plunged downward for the longer portion of the trip, the situation worsened markedly. One factor was that traffic picked up, and since we were going downhill, we didn’t have the right of way and had to move to the far outer edge of the road. This was when I found out why vehicles traveled on the left: so that a left-hand-drive vehicle’s driver would have a better view of his outside wheel while moving close to the edge to pass an oncoming vehicle.
I was surprised at the amount of traffic and the size of the vehicles crossing each other up and down the road. There were many trucks loaded with goods and buses full of passengers. At times I could see the outer double tire in the back of our truck totally hanging over the cliff, not even touching the road. The fog had cleared, but the day was overcast and the light drizzle continued to fall steadily, hampering visibility and introducing mud and loose rocks on the already difficult passage.
Conversation was out of the question. Our driver, whose hands were firmly grasping the steering wheel, was a study in concentration: eyes constantly darting from rear-view mirror to side-mirrors, then out the passenger window to watch for the passing vehicle, returning to the front to avoid running into a slow car, and quickly looking out his side window to keep an eye on that cliff edge. His right arm was in constant motion, shifting through the many gears of the heavy army truck, while his left leg moved in synchronized fashion, pumping the clutch at every shift to minimize wearing out the brakes. A vehicle rolling down the mountain without brakes was unthinkable; yet, I was sure it had happened before; it didn’t take much to burn out brakes. But the worst part of all was having to back uphill when the road became too narrow for two vehicles to pass.
On one occasion the sergeant started madly blowing his horn for no apparent reason, at least, none I could discern. I wondered if he had cracked up from the strain of driving under these conditions until upon rounding a bend, we encountered a waterfall flowing over the rocks above, across the road, and continuing below until it disappeared in a cloud. The horn was alerting oncoming traffic of our approach and requesting a corresponding signal from anyone on the other side of the blind spot.
The rapid drop in altitude and temperature from cold altiplano to hot, humid rainforest stained our shirts with perspiration, caused our eardrums to pop, and contributed to the discomfort of the ride. The absence of a place to take a break in over four hours made the trip exhausting, especially for the driver.
