ROUGHING IT THROUGH BOLIVIA
Pictures to follow!.
I seem to meeting a lot of helpful people here in Bolivia, they help me find places to stay as its not always so easy and many places are down side streets without signs. Yesterday a young lad called Oscar helped me, I gave him a couple dollars and a chocolate bar for his trouble.
Then today after running a tough 40km and making my finish a late one due to many short stops to talk to the friendly locals I arrived in a small village called Calamarca.
There was a hike of about another 15 minutes off my route towards the town center. It was getting dark, with a sharp cold bite in the air.
A shop keeper directed me towards the town plaza, always a safe bet in these places. It was up a hill. I was truly shattered.
Upon my arrival in the plaza I stopped at another store where this time a man called Antonio walked from his shop across the northern end of the plaza pointing out the hostal for me, wonderful kind people here. The owner was not there but as luck would have it Antonio knew the him, a man called Francisco.
I just had a ten minute wait for Francisco after Antonio kindly phoned him for me.
So Francisco arrived in a nice big pick up truck with two other men called Ronaldo and Pedro. They brought me through the gates of the house, into a large courtyard, opened a door. My bed for the night was on some US AID mattresses on the floor, Heaven!
I asked how much and more or less an embarrassed Francisco just asked me to pay whatever is my usual payment. He seemed happy enough when I told him that so far in Bolivia $2 a night was standard!
However the lads wouldn’t let me jump on the mattress as I was bundled into the pick up and driven back down the steep hill I had just come up for a chicken and chips dinner, their treat, lovely lads!
Another couple of great days 45 and 50km took me to Konani. The first day I had the road to myself as there was a major road widening project going on. Some segments were almost finished but not yet open to the traffic, so I could run in peace, except for the odd bridge I had to run around. I always feel that a road widening project is just like building a speed way track for these guys! In fairness the Bolivians I the most courteous drivers in all of my Latin American route.
I had to run around the odd bridge under construction!
The Peruvians were easily the worst drivers I have met anywhere in the world! When the Peruvians got behind a wheel, many of them were also the most ignorant people I have ever met. I am glad to be out of there!
I have been told all the way through Latin America that there is no driving schools or driver testing as we know it.. Drivers are given a very easy oral test. Then asked.. Wait for this one! If they would rather do a driving test, cost $250 or to buy their drivers licence (without a test!) also for $250 This is the cost I have heard in almost every Latino country!
Here in Konani the first hostal, or alojamiento as they are called here was full. There was only one other which I managed to secure a bed in a three bed dormitory.
No lock on the door with a blue rag stuffed into the hole where the lock once kept intruders out. Now a nail is pulled down to keep the door closed.
No toilet or shower!! There was a chamber pot in my room but I was not sure what I was supposed to do with it when it was full! This place was called El Palacio! Or…. The Palace!
I asked the palace owner where I was supposed to pee and hopefully nothing else. He told me I had to use the Banos Publico, or public toilet across the road which was at the back of a grocery store that closes at 10pm! I better hurry!
After walking through the usual crummy yard towards the Banos Publico I was shocked to find a lovely clean shower room, with mirrors and just about everything one would not expect to find, that is except soap and toilet paper, these miracles literally cost extra here.
After something to eat I returned to the Palace to find that the spacious reception area was filled up by women and children getting ready to bed down on mattresses, right there in the reception, I think they were getting a cheaper rate.
From there next day I ran the 37km to a place called Caracollo. The lady in the first alojamiento told me she had a room and then for some strange reason changed her mind and told me she had none! She had a dirty greasy face, like she was licking out the grease from a grill tray in a cooker! Actually many of the women I have met this last week have these dirty oily faces. I never did find out why, it’s like they just came up from an oil well. I had to use all my diplomatic skills when a proud Bolivian man asked me what I thought of their women!
Then I went to another 6 places in this small but spread out town and found that they were either closed down or full.
I had an invitation to stay the following night in Oruro the following night, so just commuted there and rang my friend Juan Carlos.
That was grand, Juan Carlos brought me out to a nice restaurant but I insisted on paying for the dinner.
Then the next day I returned to my previous finishing point and ran the 37 km right up to his doorstep. It was also his brother Jorge’s 50th birthday and they were having a birthday party for him in the house. Family members had traveled over from England, Italy and Germany.
Juan Carlos’s father is a retired attorney, so they are a privileged class here in Bolivia.
His family put on a nice party, no shortage of food or drink or services. It was so nice to be given a knife as well as a fork as so many restaurants just give out forks.
I crossed all of Peru and much of Bolivia and have yet to see an electric kettle or microwave, such is the poverty of these countries, not only the prohibitive purchase of these items but the cost of the electricity. My friend Joss said in Peru that electricity is just as expensive there as it is in the UK.
Next day at km 251 I ran my 20,000th kilometre of the run 
My luck was in that day as I felt I deserved a steak, and not the usual ice cubed-sized steaks normally served here. So I stopped early in a place called Machacamarca and soon tracked down a lady by the unlikely name of Donna Tallon who seemed to own half of the village. Well a shop, alojamiento and the only restaurant in the town a place called Parador Restaurant. And what do you think was on the menu! Llama steaks! That’s what I had a lovely steak, chips and salad for only $4
Next day I met an English man called Mateo who has a Spanish mother and they live in Barcelona. Mateo teaches English for a living and loves his life. It’s great being a cyclist that loves to travel and to be a teacher with three months off in the summer is just Heaven he told me over lunch in a small town called Poopo.
He cycles all over the world for a short time every year. This year it’s Bolivia. He also loves to climb and I think he has some ropes packed in his panniers. I suggested he should do a world cycle in about 4 or 5 stages, I got him thinking I think!
Then just up the road I got halted again by a friendly Italian called Pablo.
So Pablo cycled on, and low and behold he knocked on my hotel room door that night, inviting me into his room for a delicious tuna and pasta dinner. He cooked the meal on his fuel stove. Yes that’s one nice thing about travelling by bike one can carry more luxuries also have more freedom that a tent offers, meaning you don’t have to stay in places like El Palacio as I had to a few nights ago. It will be nice when I get Nirvana back and can take a proper tent with me.
Another night I slept in another dormitory with about six beds, I think there are about nine altogether in the dorm, including a father and his young son, a boy of about eight years of age in the same bed. Imagine doing that in the west. It was in a small town called Challapata.
I am heading for a place on the Argentine border called Villazon. There are two roads to Villazon, one a longer one and the other about a days run shorter but on a gravel road. On my map this shorter route looks like a dodgy route as there are fewer places to stay and commuting could be problematic but its also flatter than the longer mountainous route via Potasi. Its a very hard call. I am undecided and eventually decide on the longer mountainous route through the silver mining town of Potasi.
So I show my map to the manager a friendly man called Vladamir. He tells me there is a woman inside that lives in America, so I follow Vladimir into the family kitchen. They make me breakfast of pancakes and peanut butter! It turns out the owners daughter a woman called Jessica has been living in the USA for 20 years and is back for a holiday to see the family. Jessica has a cleaning business in Washington DC. She tells me that its not possible for anyone to live on $20 a day! I think this is an amazing statement for a Bolivian, even if she has moved to the USA, surely she should be aware that her own country people are struggling by on just a fraction of that?
Out running on the road the next day the scenery is ever changing from barren desert like to lush pastures with overhanging trees onto the road as I continue running over the Bolivian altiplano. Yes it’s been tough, I still have to stop from time to time to get my breath back. Today I ran around Lake Poopo. It was a nice warm day, It seems that even the winter days here are warmer than Irish summer days, it’s about 30 C here. At the end of my 36 km I commute back to Challapata and next morning have breakfast once again with Jessica and her family. This kind of hospitality has been very rare in Latin America, hospitality by a business establishment I mean. I think I could count the amount of times on one hand since leaving Mexico in which I have been helped by business owners. It seems that when they hear what I am doing its lights on to ‘ screw me ‘ rather than help me as in Canada, USA and Mexico. For me Bolivia is a cut above many of the other Latino countries but their food, just like in Ecuador and especially Peru is just puke tinder.
