April 4, 2000
Day 165 Road to La Paz: to Lahuachaca
It’s still cold this morning, but not as bad as last night. There is hoar frost on our pannier bags. Our plan today is to go to Caracollo (30 km’s) and take a rest day. We are on the Altiplano and the cycling is relatively easy after the past 2 days of 2000 meters gains in altitude.
We get to Caracollo early, 9 am. Patrick suggests we take a bus to La Paz, that the cycling the next two days will be about the same on the Altiplano. There are two buses, we check and are told both are full. We are told there is a strike going on and there will be few busses. In Cochabamba, Patrick had talked with 2 Dutch students about the dissatisfaction and strikes going on over the tax on oil and gasoline and water price increases.
So we ride on, about every 10 km’s is a small village, some have only one or two soldiers. One stretch had soldiers with rifles lining both side of the street, Patrick thought it looked like something had been burned across the road. Villages had been putting up barricades to stop the traffic.
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Riding is going well, we are 130 km’s from La Paz and its 2:30. We are thinking we may be able to get within distance to reach La Paz tomorrow. Rachel crests a hill to Lahuachaca and sees a crowd, two trucks have stopped. She waits and rest for Patrick. We try to figure out what might be going on. We ride on slowly and around the trucks. The people are building a barricade of rocks. The people are friendly to us, now, but one never knows a crowd mentality.
Patrick notices a sign for habitacione right by the barricade. It’s probably better to be off the road. As we are checking in, a military truck with troops arrive. We have a roof top view of the event. The troops face off the crowd. The barricade is at a point in the road where vehicles can’t just drive around. Eventually the crowd walks toward the center of town. The troops clear the road, then get into the vehicle and wait. After awhile, they drive on. Eventually the barricade is rebuilt. It’s 5:30 now, and the crowd is still together. There’s not much traffic, Patrick says the villages on either side of this one must be doing a good job. It's interesting watching civil disobedience in another country.
But for now, we have a little adobe hut for the night. We’ve had a hot shower and will have a comida of the house for dinner.
Today's ride: 92 km (57 miles)
Total: 5,499 km (3,415 miles)
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