Copcabana, La Paz, and the Most Dangerous Road in the World

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It would have been terribly difficult to say goodbye to Copacabana, that little piece of lakeside paradise, had I not eaten the falafel that pressed the bright red emergency exit button adjacent to my spleen. It was my last day in town, and the falafel was delicious, but if you think of a little Alien bastard trying to rip itself through a belly, you’ll have some idea of what the falafel was trying to accomplish. Worse, I had to run up a 200m hill, at altitude, to find a throne to depose this king of chickpeas. It’s moments like these, beneath a glittering Milky Way, when you really have a one-on-one with God.

This regrettable adventure aside, Copacabana on the shores of Lake Titicaca will always have a soft spot in my gonzo heart. It doesn’t have the sandy beaches of its more famous Brazilian counterpart, in fact it doesn’t have a beach at all, but the light is special, the lake sparkling, the food (usually) great and best of all, it’s super cheap. I bade farewell to La Cupula and the dreadlocked hippies lining Avenue 6 de Agosto, catching the wonderful Transturin catamaran once more to the Isla de Sol, en route to La Paz. Stopping off for a meaningful conversation with Chico the vicuña, I headed towards the vast, flat region known as the Altoplano, a spine of snowcapped Andes Mountains on the left, the blue-ruby Titicaca on the right. It reminded me of an Arctic tundra, where nothing grows above knee height. A few, non-indigenous, Spanish-speaking trees dotted the landscape, but otherwise the land was impossibly flat, an earthy mirror of the sky above. The bus passed small villages, many of which looked like the set of a post-nuclear Ridley Scott thriller, hopefully not starring Kevin Costner. Cows, sheep, donkeys, llamas and pigs seemed to roam free in anarchy. Barefoot children played football on dusty fields as the sun set behind me, splashing the sky in deep purple, the clouds like smoke on the water. If I were God were a day. Esrock Almighty, I’d find the time to plop a giant, red-glazed cherry on the sharp point of a snow-capped Andean mountain. On Sundae, He said, let there be ice cream.

You could tell La Paz was approaching, because all of a sudden we were surrounded by hundreds of horn-blaring mini-taxis, carving their own lanes out of thin air. It was if the sky opened up and rained soldiers, disco lights, food stalls and bony dogs. The bus took some sphincter-pounding pothole hits, and then a long, steep decline to the highest capital city in the world, over four kilometers above the sea.

My soft landing in Lima was juxtaposed by the hectic thump of arriving late at night in one of the world’s most hair-raising cities. The German tourists on the bus looked petrified as the bus dropped me off opposite a throbbing market, people everywhere, car horns, noise, screams. They were on their way to the Radisson, I was on my way to Arthys Guesthouse, or hell, which ever came first. La Paz, I have been told, is not the city you want to walk around at night, with a backpack. So there I was, walking around La Paz, at night, with a backpack. Arthys was full, but its owner Rueben, a small bearded man who reminded me of a theatre lecturer, saved my life by walking me to another hotel, “I am your guide and your body guard!” he said as a car narrowly avoided squashing my feet, weaving through the narrow streets. I will always be thankful to Rueben (sounds like Robin!), who no doubt, would do the same for you too. Now Bolivia, never the world’s most stable nation, is once again in political turmoil. Due to roadblocks and strikes, the president handed in his resignation a few days ago. Congress rejected it, so he called for an early election. Congress rejected that too. The indigenous Aymara population are protesting taxes, shutting down the state infrastructure in certain regions. We walk past the government building, surrounded by death-squad looking platoons armed with machine guns, and lo, here is the Hotel Torrini. At least I’ll get a good view of the action. I choose the room on the highest floor and as far from the stairs as possible. It looks like an upscale prison cell, but I’m so thankful to be off the street I grab it. I could swear I hear gunshots, but its probably just firecrackers. Probably. A sign at reception warns tourists about fake policemen, fake cabs, fake tourists and fake money. “Don’t believe the bad stories,” I tell myself, a solid mantra for any traveler. The friendly guy at reception advises against finding a bar at this time of night, and I concur, crashing on my rock hard pillow, listening to the City Hall clock chime twelve times over the soft hum of the city.

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