"Who are these guys?"

If I had of known how hard the ride from Tupiza to Uyuni was going to be I probably would not have done it at all. I do very little research preferring to ride what I see with the knowledge that I have enough equipment and provisions to see me through any mishaps safely. That for me is adventure cycling. However, if I had looked into what lay ahead of me then I would have known that the route I was about to undertake was the 'death-trail' of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. This was the route they undertook to carry out their last heist. The crime duo had fled to South America due to the chase of the Pinkerton Detective Agency (FBI). Legend has it that they heard of wages being delivered by mule to the Aramayo silver mine near Huaca Huanusca, which they believed to be worth half a million dollars. Thus, they set off from Tupiza to rob the miners' payroll before it was delivered. Having succeeded they headed to the town of San Vincente two days ride away for cover. On arrival they found lodgings for the night only for the owner to turn them in by giving up their location to the captain leading the chase. There was a shoot-out and both Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid met their end in San Vincente. That's was 1908 and how the story goes. The bodies of the two outlaws were exhumed in 1991 by a team from the US but they were unable to conclude that they were in fact the bodies of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Apparently the body of Sundance Kid was that of a German; Franz Zimmer. It is hard to know what happened next but locals believe that one of the gringos turned the gun on his friend before turning it upon himself. However, their aliases can supposedly be tracked back to Patagonia and other places after the shoot-out, which suggests they lived out a long-life.

Regardless, having watched the movie I was aware of the town of San Vincente and I knew I would be passing the turn-off for it at some point on my route. It was too far out of my way to make the trip to the town itself but having started the ride from Tupiza I very much felt like I was back on my horse again as I rode through river-beds, across ridges and through canyons. It was beautiful terrain although I was still clinging to the hope that Bolivia was on a high-plain as opposed to the rolling hills I was experiencing. There is 700ms of difference in altitude between Tupiza and Uyuni but because Bolivia has not been mapped properly the details of the route are sketchy. My Reise map seems nothing more than a suggestion as it is not too accurate at all with incorrect distances and roads in the wrong places. It looked like I would have to climb to over 4000ms but what the climb would be like I had no idea as the topography of my map was in wide 1000m bands. Unfortunately the Bolivians are not much wiser. The general practice is to ask five people and aggregate the answers ... unfortunately this only confuses matters as you now have six different answers. The only decent indication is to ask how long it takes to get there by car but the greater the distance the more varied the answers. Three hours by car can be considered a full-day on the bike. Nonetheless one never reckons on being taken to the brink as was the case for me this time around.

I started the day badly from Tupiza. I had decided to buy breakfast in town and I got them to make some sandwiches for lunch. Being Sunday everything opened a little later than usual which delayed me. I then took the wrong road out of town only advancing further because the people I asked confirmed I could cross onto the correct road a few kilos out of town. I did not realise that the cross they meant was a river crossing. All part of the fun in Bolivia I guess. I had decided to take the road to Atocha as opposed to the train tracks which some cyclists have taken before me. Once on the right road I was having a great time of things. I was on ripio but it was as good as ripio gets; bad but consistently bad. It was hard-packed and so I was confident of making it to the town of Atocha which lies 100k equidistant between Tupiza and Uyuni. Passing through the town of Salo I could see the road lifting ahead. No bother, it looked like a gentle 200ms of elevation. It was, but around the bend was another ramp and then another and then another. I have never climbed a mountain with so many false tops. If was fine for a while as I was aware that I would have to climb over 4000ms but the riding was made doubly hard by the gale in my face. The wind was robbing me of half my speed and half my balance. It was very tricky riding. Naturally the continuous false tops did not help my morale and soon I realised that I was climbing on a ridge to a mountain top that lay somewhere else. By this stage I had done a fair amount of climbing but I could still not see a top. It was getting particularly frustrating as there was very little traffic to calm the nerves and any which I flagged down for guidance did not stop. I was getting concerned as the road was now constantly dropping and climbing sharply such that I had no idea if there was a summit at all. It was unlike any mountain I had ever climbed and the wind was swallowing any curses of frustration before they had even escaped my mouth. It did not help when at last one Bolivian stopped and told me that the road was level after the next peak. It turned out that he was having a laugh. At this stage I was up over 4000ms but I had done 1750ms of vertical climbing for the day on ripio into a strong head-wind. I had to pull in with only 50 of the 200k to Uyuni covered. Being a mountain flat ground for pitching a tent was in short supply unless I descended into the valley between the ridges, which I was loathe to do. I eventually found a spot which was reasonably obscured from view of the road for safety. I hoped that the wind would calm down once the sun set but at over 4000ms the normal rules don't apply. It looked like my bags would have to stay in the tent to help anchor it from the gusts. Thankfully I still had a few episodes of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" to watch on my iPod. I treasure these moments with my iPod as they really allow me to escape from whatever precarious situation I am in. One has to remember that camping on one's own is not a whole heap of fun so I really rely on books or tv shows to while away the hours in the tent.

I did not have the best of nights sleep as the wind threatened to blow my house down on numerous occasions. Still, I was up early and ready for action. I had no idea of what was to come but like any problem all you can do is break it down into bite-size chunks and work your way through it piece by piece. Needless to say the next 62k to Atocha were equally as bad as the previous 50k from Tupiza. It was both heart-breaking and leg-breaking. I had never ridden a mountain like it. It simply did not have a summit at all and it was clear to me that Bolivians needed to learn the art of building viaducts. It was nothing but more murderous ups and downs and having to ride 5kph was simply soul-destroying. At last I could see the mountain peak that was causing me so much damage; it was the snow peak of El Cholorque a few kilometres away rising to 5614ms. So this is what the Andes are really like, Argentina was nothing but a warm-up. I eventually crested onto some sort of a plain albeit far from flat and I proceeded to ride a c-ring around this peak. Surely it would have been easier to have gone around El Cholorque in the other direction? At this stage I was getting closer to Atocha but I was having serious doubts about my ability to make it to Uyuni under my own steam. I had no idea what size town Atocha would be but if it was anything like the towns I passed then the villagers lead a subsistence life and I should not really deprive them of the only food they have. I have to say, it is very humbling to see Bolivians living in these nothing villages so high up in the sky. There is not much for them here but for llama farming and mining. There are certainly no shops so everything is taken directly from the land or else the UN or somebody else is making weekly food-drops. I have no idea why someone would persist with such a harsh life but I can only imagine that their belief system varies considerably to that of ours.

With morale at an all time low I finally dropped into the town of Atocha. It was an odd little town perched beside a dam. I stopped at the bus station which is just a concrete square with the aim of finding out how I could jump on a bus to Uyuni. However, I first made sure to consult with the locals on the road ahead. I did not have the legs to climb out of town but I was comforted by the fact that once I had finished the climb that I would be on a plain again. What this meant I had no idea but I decided to take them at their word. While I was busy receiving applause from tourists waiting for their connecting bus to Uyuni I decided to stay in Atocha for the night as I could stock up on food again and get a good night's kip. This was an unexpected bonus. If the route promised to be as hard as the ride to Tupiza then I would just have had to accept that I was a broken man. If something is not fun then it is not fun and it's not fun doing over 3250ms vertical into a gale. I graciously accepted the plaudits from the tourists who had done the same route by bus but they did not realise how close I was to joining them. As I said, one needs to break problems down and life constantly reminds me that patience is a virtue. On the run into Atocha I had started to notice bike tracks in the ripio in front of me. This had been a huge boost to morale because if cyclists up the road could do it then so could I. Of course, it is difficult to know if they were touring cyclists or locals but it was this that gave me the resolve to continue. All I wanted to know was "who are these guys?"

I had 100k+ to cover to Uyuni and I was hoping to make it one day. I was promised that the climb out of town was only 10k long but if turned out to be 20k. However, I was now certainly on the trail of what seemed like adventure cyclists. Looking at their tracks it seemed that they were riding heavy duty tyres like mine but the tracks were intermittent and not too fresh. It was a pleasant surprise to eventually crest onto the plain and for it to be an actual flat plain. The road was hard-packed and all was looking very good. Passing the turn to San Vincente I put on my Butch Cassidy cowboy hat and giddied my hos to track down these cyclists. Their tyre tracks were starting to look a bit fresher and they were making my job easier in finding the easiest part of the ripio to ride. If one track jumped over to the other side of the road to join the other track then that was the smoothest part of the road to ride. At this stage the road had turned into a construction site again. It was littered with corrugations which one has to ride very much like a horse with all your weight in the stirrups so that your ass can bounce freely off the saddle. It was bloody tough riding but at least the scenery was very cool. The pursuit was causing my adrenaline to boil and it enabled me to block out how desperate and slow-going the road was. For sure, it was on a par with the worst road I have seen on my trip so far and 50k of it on tired legs was a big ask. If it had been any other day it would have been a disaster but the thrill of the chase was keeping me going; "who are these guys?"

After another series of false flats I eventually spotted something in the distance, it was only a motor-bike but then around the next bend I could see riders moving all over the road trying to find the easier ground. At last, I had tracked them down; Tom and Tom from Amsterdam and Matt from California. I had in fact met Tom before in lingo school in Mendoza and it was due to a totally bizarre series of events that we would meet up again on the road 10k from Uyuni.

No doubt, those three days were the hardest three days of my bike-trip so far. I have never been on the brink so much before and if it hadn't have been for the ghost of Butch Cassidy and the tyre tracks I don't think I would have made it by bike at all. While Uyuni is only 700ms higher than Tupiza at 3670ms, I in fact rode 4500ms vertical to get there. That was a mammoth task in such gales and on such bad roads.

Next stop, the largest salt desert in the world.

Marco, Butch and Sundance

the river-crossing out of Tupiza

canyon-landup on the ridge nowbase-camp? At 4000ms+ here and I had no idea where this monster climb was going.signs of life ... it is hard to believe people live here but they doSo there's the summit. El Cholorque @ 5614ms - it was this snow-peak that was doing the damageAtochathings are starting to look up - good ripio on a flat plain but not for longThe turn for San Vincente ... Butch and Sundance would have regretted turning herewatering-hole"who are these guys?" ... tracking tyre-tracksyou don't need to go to the seaside for the beachfloating peaksthe thrill of the chase - "these guys"the guys- Tom & Tom from Amsterdam and Matt from California

Comments

[Nick]

Giller,

Looking healthy and well.. Love the photos!

How have you become so informed on SA politics? Lots of reading in the downtime?

Where is next on the trip?

Dropped into Lorky last night.. We were collecting a dress that Sari borrowed from Helen.. He's is good form- had the paint brush in his hand!

Take care!!