Being Butch

A shampoo stall in La Paz´s 30 block street market.
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Most people would name thier first born daughter after a loving grandmother, near an dear friend, a Catholic saint. Instead, my parents-clearly deluged by thier time on a Colorado ranch- chose to name thier one and only daughter after an infamous outlaw of the Wild West. Yes, Cassidy, Butch Cassidy. Now this certain gun slinging, bank robbing fellow realized that he could only run from the law across the American West so many times. So, undoubtably in some dusty saloon, in some frontier town, he picked an even wilder frontier to where he could really escape. He chose a place where mountains bled silver, where peaks sratched the stars, and deserts streched on past the horizon. He chose a place meant only for people with some serious grit. And then he turned to his comarad and partner in crime san said:

So this thing really can really cook my dinner, huh?
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¨Kid, the next time I say it, lets go some place like Bolivia. Let´s go some place like Bolvia.¨ (Paul Newman in ¨Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid)

Hell Bent Intentions

And what do you know, they got up and did it.

So being a proud Cassidy, what was I to do but, in fact, go some place like Bolivia, where both the life and landscape are infinitely fiercer than the Wild West both Butch and I call home. And where better than La Paz, the de facto capital by military hiest. From 14,000 feet La Paz introduced itself, spreading out below our bus as a tangle of red brick buildings smashed between sheer cliffs and unforgiving ridges, all dwarfed by the 20,000 foot, icebound peak of Mount Illimani.

World´s Most Dangerous Road
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Perhaps the cold weather and lack of oxygen in the world´s highest capital city help to preserve an old and other way of life. One which includes burying llama fetuses-readily available on the street- under your house for good luck. However, tourism brings modern phenomenas such as, say, a microbrewery, to intermingle what is traditional with what is hip. Said microbrewery, supposedly the highest in the world, also served as our hostel. Not only where we albe to enjoy the best beer we´ve had in countries, but it was served by Andy, former bartender/barista at none other than Loaded Joes in good old Avon, Colorado. So reminissing about home sweet home, this waywar bunch of skiers attempted to learn to salsa dance. Let´s just say we´re better off with our feet securely clipped to parabolic sticks.

Don´t worry if you´re cold, we´ll be in a hot, humid jungle by lunch
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With sore toes, we decided that perhaps mountain biking would be more up our alley. So the next morning we clamoured on a bus to bike down the 11,000 vertical feet of ¨The World´s Most Dangerous Road.¨ After outfitting our group-composed of wife beater-wearing, muscle-flexing Aussi men and us- with safety gear and assuring us not to worry, most of the deaths had been Isrealis, we started down. Now normally outnumbered as I was by muchachos, I would be bound and etermined to prove my ability to stay up front. But there was something that that Aussis and Worth didn´t quite grasp. This was the world´s most dangerous road.

Little damp
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We started at 15,500 feet and after 3 hours of biking on a washed out, rock strewn, road eroding to the 1500 foot cliff below, we arrived at 4,000 feet in altitude. This would be the equivalent of biking from the top of Vail Pass to the beach in 3 hours, with the Grand Canyon dropping off to your immediant left. So, in a very un-Butch moment I proudly played sweep nearly all the time.

When we arrived in the Amazon Jungle for a monkey-accompanied feast we were given t-shirts to commend our surviving. At least, that´s what the boys´said, mine mentions something about being a devil women next to a picture of a very curvy woman of such hell bent intentions. Charming.

Luckily they made us get off for this one.
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Three hours by bus back up the new road to La Paz, and we were able to celebrate what was surely one of the most riveting and spectacular days of the trip.

The next day found us on an 8 hour bus for a brief visit to Cochabamba to investigate solar stoves. After being wined and dined to-what? sushi!? in Bolivia? we were on our way again. As if the highest capital in the world weren´t good enough, we set off in pursuit of the highest city, Potosi.

Love, Cass