The Death Road

Still on my adventurous streak i decided to take a bike ride down the worlds most dangrous road-
At the hostel i was staying in La Paz many people had done the road and told me it was great fun- The best (and safest) company was called "Gravity", however due to a couple of budget problems i decided not to pay the $75 at Gravity but find a more economical option- i paid $31! Bonus i thought. This wasn't the opinion shared by others i told of my bargainous find- sucicidal seemed to be their thought, with the exeption of a canadian who offered to accompany me. Its a road, i thought how scary is it going to be?..
the day of the ride arrived, the first issue was that our tour operator wasn't picking us up from the hotel but we had to make our way to the office for 7.30am. At the office we found that we were sharing our intial transport with another company- thats not really a problem just a little more environmental i figured. We reached the site for the start of the ride, all the bikes were unloaded and extensive checks were made on them- all of them except for 2 that is. Guess who whose belonged to? It turns out that my budget company wasn't to interested in checks. We put on our 'all weather' gear ( i now resemble an orange teletubby) and set off whilst the other group was beginning their safety talk. The wide road was smooth and fully paved, the guide shot off and we followed close behind- this is easy i thought. At the first stopping point he guide pointed over the edge to show us the remains of a bus and a car that had taken a corner too quickly, still i wasn't too worried the road was wide, with little traffic.
After riding some more and stopping at the top of a 'what seemed to last forever' up hill section (now think sweaty teletubby) we stopped, had some refreshments and waited for the other group to arrive. Our guide mentioned something about the road starting just ahead and sticking to the left side now (instead of the right) i vaguely nodded, not quite understanding fully what he was talking about. The other group arrived and this time we too listened the safety talk (this time in english) and i realised we hadn't even started the death road. We set off again...
And in moments reach, what can best be described as a dirt track steeply descending the mountain side, no saftey barriers and an abyss of several hundred metres to my immediate left. gulp. it'll be ok i think, the guide told us we'd take it easy and all stay 3m apart- whoosh, the guide and the more adventurous boys leave me in a cloud of dust, i set off in an attempt to catch up and just as i'm getting close i hear shouts of stop, stop. We all skid to a halt just as a huge truck hurtles around the corner leaving us gasping for air, but this time i'm ready for the quick start and manage to keep up with the others. We all fly down the road (me slightly faster than i want due to fairly unresponsive brakes) at each hair pin bend there stands a man (or more often a boy of about 8) holding a big square of plastic- one side red and the other green, acts as a sort of human traffic light- i just hope they keep paying attention.
I'm beginning to enjoy this and find as long as i'm not looking down its fun and not actually scary. I find my own pace and realise i don't have to be right behind the boys all the time, then just as i turn a corner expecting more open road i see the rest off my group, one of the boys completely covered in dust and two others hauling his bike back from over the edge.... Going far too fast one of them had slid his bike over the edge but managed to jump off in time before following it over himself! The guide didn't stop and so after dusting himself off we all set off again- this time only slightly slower.
We made our way down without too much further incident (that same boy did fall off once more however!!!- looney) and i wasn't even last. At the bottom after a final and very dusty head count we got a lift up the hill to the small town of Coreico for a well deserved shower, lunch and swim in the pool of a lovely hotel (where i stayed the night before continuing on to the Jungle).