Recently I saw a picture taken of supplies lying spread out on a bed. All these packs and bags strung together looked like a preperation for Halloween. In truth it was the proviant my cycling friend took into the desert, a long stretch in front of her and lots of days in the mountains of Peru behind her.

 

The charme of cycling is the beauty of little things and moments. At this point I don't want to talk about the nature or examples how an indegenous mother chases her son with a belt, I want to talk about the days cyclists are reentering societies, the moment they find a good coffee, a supermarket which sells peanutbutter, somebody finds his favorite flavor of bonbons or just a clean toilet. I want to talk about suprises, the moment somebody puts out a package of chocolade cookies after he finished three days of hiking. Warm instant noodles in a cold night or the joy to swap your shirt for more necessary gloves.
Most of the time I buy the same stuff at little shops. The variety isn't huge. Then, sometimes after weeks, I pass the entry of a real supermarket. It is a feeling, comparable with a visit at Toys'r'us as I was a child. My eyes are getting wide open. I almost jump around in pure joy. For instance, blue cheese can make my day. I will show my glas of peanutbutter to all my friends. I present it as for what it is: a treasure. As I am writing this to you, I am so happy about my German "Nutella" I bought in a supermarket in La Paz. Armin bought three of them to get a stock.
It is funny which things are highlighting a day if you have left the society and re-enter. "I washed all my clothes and an old lady repaired my shoes for almost nothing!" I heard a fellow cyclist saying this week in full joy.
Today I went to the movies without planning or having an interest in a special film. Just to stand in a multifunctional complex like this was a nice feeling. I love this events. It is like experiencing everything new from point zero. It is magic. In this context I want to say something about La Paz, Bolivia. It is a really nice city in Latin America. While Cusco is pretty, it is somehow made for tourists and I missed the flair I could find in La Paz, a modern city in Latino style.

After days of good coffee and food, I booked my tour to the summit of Huayna Potosí, a 6088meter high snow capped mountain close to La Paz. I waited for Joanna to arrive cause I trust her. I will be attached by a rope to my guide and her and if one of us is unable to reach the summit the other one has to return as well. Furthermore there will be some scratchy moments and I am happy to walk with her instead giving my life into the hands of an inexperienced stranger.
We booked the three days package which includes a day of training with the equipment. In respects of totally unawareness what skills are needed to climb over 6000m, it seemed logical to do that day more. Before we arrived at the basecamp in 4750m altitude, we passed a old graveyard. The camp is close by a turquoise reservoir which provides 80% of the used electricity in Bolivia. As our training started we walked up to a glacier and changed into the mountaineering clothes. The first use of the gear on ice was hilarious. We climbed up a steep hill and became confident by using the ice ax and the boots. As we climbed with the ax it was fascinating how the crampons under my shoes could hold my weight by putting the four front spikes in the ice. The glacier had a fascinating aura. As we walked back I couldn't wait for the next day. I really head to climb over 6000 meters, it's a unbelievable thought.
With the first use of the toilet, you already lost the battle. But I was so afraid about altitude sickness, that I drunk at least six liters. Four times I climbed out of my bed and the night became short. Not just for me. Some others had problems to sleep as well. But I planned with this sleep deprivation. Its normal for me. The weather conditions were miserable and our guides predicted the same fog-rain-hail mixture for our upcoming climb to the top. But before we could show our mountaineer abilities, we had to reach the high camp on 5300m. No problem with good shoes. You can bet that I was the only idiot without hiking boots. Even worse, no sole profile and holes on several parts, it became pretty hard to walk as we reached the snowy areas. Once arrived at the highcamp there was nothing to do than eat and hope that the overcast disappears. It did. The view was amazing.
Without sleeping I put on my equipment to start the climbing to the summit at 1:30h AM. The guide lead us. Joanna was at the second position. The rope was knotted on me, no chance for a quick release. Hello destiny, be good to me! After 30 minutes steep walking in the snow I shouted to Jo:

"Did you see that hole?"
"What?"

She turned around and stopped walking. This was definitely not what I intended.

 

"Go, go, go, go!"

I stood right next to a crack in the ice. As we walked back in daylight, we saw how deep it was. Definitely no place where I want to rest.
 

"Go, go, go, goooo!"

The lights over El Alto/ La Paz shimmered in the wide. The decreasing moon was still strong enough to lighten up the surroundings. But apparently there was no time for sightseeing. Suddenly I couldn't walk anymore, not even with the technique of sideway steps. I rammed my ice ax in the ice and started to climb up. 20meter straight up. My lungs screamed. In this moment I was pretty happy to have taken the extra day of practicing. We walked through the snow. More and more up. After passing some cracks I could see the summit for the first time. It seemed to be so close but we had still much altitude to climb. I thought: How? After a short but serious climb with the ice ax I have had known the answer. We paused on a kind of balcony at almost 6000meter. The nature in front of me was that beautiful, I could have end my day there. But we had to continue, the famous ridge waited for us. My ice ax crashed into the ice. After that wall I looked over the little snow wall in front of mine and realised, I am on the ridge. Not more than 30cm to walk on. On the left side it went down without any protection. On the right my ax could be hit into a wall of ice, sometimes just 50cm high before it dropped down for hundreds of meter. A deep breathe was necesary before I continued because the rope becomes to a permanent urge on. Meter by meter I got closer to the top. Suddenly there was nothing to climb left. The summit at 6088m. I sat down, checked my pants. I did not grab in of fear. Excellent! My eyes were fixed on the horizon, red lit. We just arrived for the sunrise at 5:50am, after four hours fight against the altitude, snow and coldness. I turned around, 360° view and every inch was mindblowing. I looked at Jo, her face told me the same fascination. We did it and its beautiful! The guides called to return but we stayed longer. The scenery flashed my mind. I guess I will never forget this moment.

 

The quote out of my diary that day:
"I still can't believe what happened the last days. I went off to climb my first 6000m+ mountain. We arrived at our basecamp next to an extreme turquoise reservoir. We had some time to enjoy a normal life before everything changed. My first mountaineering experience started with iceclimbing on a glacier. The next day we took our equipment up to 5300m. As we arrived it was all overcast but suddenly the view was extraordinary good. The last hours before we would climb on 6088m, the peak of Huayna Potosí, Bolivia. At 1,30h am I got connected with a rope to my guide and Joanna. We started to walk beside cracks which scared the shit out of me. A twenty meter wall had to be climbed by using an ice ax. After a while we sat on a small balcony on 6000m to take our breathe. I was so happy to be there but it wasn't finished. Just after this pause the most intense time of my life began. A ten meter wall brought us to the famous ridge. This ridge is never wider than 30 centimetres and drops to both sides into the deep. It's just you and your balance. If one of the three attached person falls down, you are done. In some parts you belong only to your ice ax, no more. We arrived for the sunrise. Please imagine the most beautiful view you can. I loved to be there, over all. The moon above, the sun rising, my dear friend Joanna Smith next to me. The comment "you are first" took my adventure to another level, I had to climb back the ridge in front of us. The only way back. At the worst point, the ridge was not existing anymore, I had all my weight on the ice ax, my feet just superficially supporting, the arms sidewards, something frightening happened. The rope caught on a rock. I was there, couldn't move back nor forth. Joanna was not able to loose the rope and it became the longest seconds of my life. We walked ahead, the sun in our backs, climbing down in the most astonishing nature. I am so confused that I did that. One of the best days of my life."

 

"Brownie con helado y un cafe destilado doble, por favor."
"Everyday Hot-Brownie with icecream and a fresh hot coffee, this has to find an end. The last days were the most laziest I had since months. I leave La Paz, Bolivia and cycle towards the salt flats. A lonely place, hot sun but minus degrees. I am back on my bike, yipi"

Almost everyday I chilled in the park, went almost everytime to the same café and watched uncountable movies in the cinemas of La Paz. It was time to leave. Not just because I morphed into a parasite, beside that I have an appointment in Santiago de Chile in a bit more than a month. 3000km. As I became aware of that high amount of cycling hours, I got the heat. I won't skip to cycle the Salar de Uyuni, a 10000m³ huge salt flat, but I will have to do it alone. Nobody wants to go my speed. Moreover I will skip the laguna route, a ten days addition to the hardcore cycling I will experience on my five days trip to and through the Salar de Uyuni. Something deep inside of me never wanted to do this torture, even I know this will be something with the "you will remember" attribute. I left all my companions and hit the road. It should become a hilarious week.

Leaving the mainroad direction which leads south to the city of Uyuni, was the first step to a survival training I did not have experienced in that intensity until now. Immediately I had to fight the south-westerly winds. Unless the road is good this would not course many problems. But the road disappeared after a while. These two hours for fithteen kilometers under a strong sun and cold winds, should have been a warning but I continued. Emotionalized by the pink flamingos I saw passing their time in a small shallow lake, I climbed up to the city of Quillacas and got a second insight of what is upcoming: different roads but no signs of dirrctions. Beside this uncertainty it was the road condition which tested me. Sand, washboard, stones, gravel, salt, mud. Sometimes combined. Last but not least this area is outbounded enough to be concerned about water and food. Why should anyone cycle there? I don't know but I did it.
The winds after 2pm emptied my tank, my energy was at its lowest as I finally climbed the hill close to Tambo Tambillo. From there I saw all the sanddevils running over the dry valley. I cycled in a wonderful and forsaken area but in front of me lay down a small village. Totally abandoned of adults I played with some children until one asked " Hombre o Mujer?". Man or woman, aha... My appearance with the long beard, deep voice and a male name was not evidently enough for that Bolivian girl. If my hair is longer than her it causes doubts. The door of the school building opened as I knocked at it. I found my place to sleep, away from the wind and coldness.
An abandoned landscape it at its best in the morning and evening hours. At this time a mystical charme lies over the nature. The day before I was surprised about the "good" roadcondition I was confronted with. Bolivia is actually building one. The process was much easier than at the following day and I had one of the best cycle experiences. As a result of the stony washboard I turned right on the flats where I located marks in the landscape. Riding in these marks gave me a feeling like on a motorcycle. Up and down, sliding away in the sand by a top speed caused by the only tailwind in a week, wild llamas were running away from me. I felt l an incarnations of the "Flash" by possessing "super-speed", which includes the ability to move extremely fast, use superhuman reflexes and seemingly violate certain laws of physics. Cycling was no work anymore, it was pure fun for an hour before the wind turned around and I had to climb a volcano on a sandy path full of rocks. It is hard to describe the roadcondition because from now on it were paths. The isolation factor multiplied but I found my talks in walking over fields to ask a farmer for directions or by finding the only family in an abandoned village which ended in a long dicussion about directions by drawing a map in the sand. After drinking Coca tea with all women of that indigenous family, I started my last 10km stretch to be as close as possible to the entrance to the salt flats. I guess it is resonable to avoid the afternoon winds in a total flat area. I waved back to the six woman as I reached the nearby hill. Almost 80 years old, the two oldest impressed me as so many old latinas by their hard work at home and in the fields. After the last hill I could see Alianza, my choosen destination for the night. The arrival became a bit weird. As usual nobody could be seen in the whole village. The last two days I cycled through really abandoned places or all people of the community met in one building of their own or another village, what had the same effect to me passing through it: abondanance. This time I found the 23 persons all together at the tiny church. Only when I walked towards the "lider", the teacher at the school on which backjard I attended to sleep, to ask him for permission, I saw the tied goat in front of an extemporary altar. Her facial expression showed pure fear everytime somebody spit alcohol on her in terms of a religious custom I suddenly became wittness of. I stepped back to wait until the end of the procession but immidiately I had the cup with aguardiente, a self brewed alcohol which you can find in whole South-America, in my hands. It was my turn to honor Saint Rosario. One first drop for the ground, to honor her and Pachamama. One drop on the goat, (I am so sorry) and the rest of the cup was for me. Again I dropped the last bit on the ground but I don't know if this was necessary. It might be part of the costum or just to clean the cup. Even after I had to do it three times in a row and dozen times more in the following hours, I did not find out. No matter where, even in the living room, they drop it on the ground first. We honored Saint Rosario with a lot of alcohol, coca leaves and dance. I liked how the aged grandmother of the teacher approached me to dance around the fire and the band (pan flute and drums). She had a face like the witches in books of the Grimm Brothers. She did not ask, she just took my arm. This was all to funny for me. I felt lucky and happy to be centrifuged by these indigenous women. All in all the dance was a run around the fire, occasionally interrupted by a 360°turn while the outer person get intensively flinged by the inner one. After she walked two times directely through the fire, drunk as she was, I lifted her over it the next time and made a round around the band with her in my arms. She was waving her arms in the air, shouting "wohuuu, wohuuu" but her face still was a symbol of terror. Little by little I felt the impact of coca leaves which I put in my mouth every few seconds I did not dance, chat or somebody gave me a cup to honor Saint Rosario. By realising the impact of Aguardiente throughout seeing the teacher crying by laudatoring the villagers and the saint, I decided to walk back to my tent. The next day would be to important to get as stoned as everyone else around. The sky was clear and uncountable stars gave me a last goodnight wish.

There must be a law that llamas are just allowed to stay sideways to you for the effect of looking up in this unique dumb way while chewing their meals. We looked at each other in stubbornness while my last pause before I entered the huge salt flat. The Salar was a enormous white area in front of me and I shouted out for happiness as I heard the cracking of salt under me for the first time. But what direction? I tale a bearing on an island in the middle of it but it was only visible after circa 10 kilometers. I can't really tell cause my bike-computer is defect since I left Joanna to ride alone in an area where it could be advantageous to have knowledge about the distances. I started cycling into the white nothing.
As soon as I stopped for a break, the sun heated me up so intensively, that I jumped back on my bike to rather cycle in the cold wind. It was time to get nacked! There are two traditions I know of by cyclists in the Salar. First, they cycle nacked for a certain time and secondly they take fantastic pictures on behalf of the irritations caused of the flat surrounding (you are as big as your cup, a sponge is trying to flat you etc.). If you are alone it is hard to take this pictures, almost impossible but I could at least toss away my clothes and that's what I did which caused a serious burn. I arrived at the island with my clothes on and got invited to eat with some guides. They provided me with food for some meals. I could have slept their but I wanted to sleep in the Salar itselves and not on an island full of cacti, other campers and hotel guests. The structure of the salt varies every few kilometer. I have had chosen an area for my camping where the salt forms rhombuses, the most flat area I could find in respect of my nonexistent mattress, a good idea. The next challenge was to build up my almost destroyed tent in a heavy westerly wind. Under some trouble and by bending my tent to the maximum, I constructed a shelter for the night. As the sun settled, the last cars left the Salar and me in total isolation. This feeling is not to describe. Maybe the attached video gives a good impression.

 

The highlight maybe was the lining up of a red facilated cloud, a crescent moon (other than in Europe just at the bottom instead of the side, forming a shape of a plate) and a bright shining star (Jupiter?). Walking in the Salar in the middle of the night is an enormously strange feeling. You feel like on the moon. Everything is white, it is cold, nothing to see than stars but these everywhere until the horizon because there are no objects to hide behind. By eating peanutbutter with a spoon out of the cup, I awaited the sunrise. The first cars passed by, tourists were leaning out of the window, cheering and taking pictures of how I packed my things to start cycling. It was time to get nacked, again. I missed a good picture of me doing it, that's why I did it another time in the freezing morning hours. A 10000m³ salt flat gives you the necessary space to play around.

The village San Juan became the desperately needed destination to get food, water and a bed. 30km before that place the orientation becomes complicated. I met two motorcyclists while one of them had a flat tire. We discussed the route into civilisation but later I saw them taking the wrong direction. For a motorcycle not a big problem, you just drive around and a detour is nothing to complain about. As for me, the situation is more critical. Being in the middle of a desert with limited amounts of food and water is a hilarious feeling. I just entered the most crazy area as I got I flat on my own. I change the tube directly after a junction where I could chose between a narrow sandy path into nowhere or a wider road along electricity pylons. A farmer passed by and saw me laying next to my bike. I was thinking about what to do. In my hands I had a small piece of paper on which I coulfmd read something about the directions. Refering to this it seemed like I have to choose the little sandy path over the resonable looking one. The farmer told me about another route, according to him more simple. My minimal map told me of going south but the description of that guy sounded reasonable. At least a word of probable truth instead of only an uncertain describtion in the middle of nowhere. What a mistake! I cursed the first time by pushing my bike through deep sand. It took me an hour for 1.5km. "Follow this road until you enter the Salar, (no salt, just a dry and sandy part of the lake) and turn the first to the right. From there it is a direct road to San Juan." How much I would have loved that it is this easy. By entering the Salar the first question is if the little path made out of tire marks is the "first to the right" or not. I took it. Dozen of junctions and splitting roads later I saw a street sign! A real street sign! I had luck to pass a junction to a small village which caused the government to put a sign in an area which is nothing more than desert. My destination was one of the two inscriptions: 'San Juan, 24km". Oh, oh! I checked my water and realized I lost my last bottle somewhere. If the roads stay good and the wind does not start again...that was a usual but stupid thoughts. Of cause the roadcondition became horrible as it always changed from horrible to bad, back to horrible again. I made the math about the hours until my arrival, in case I make the right decisions at the numerous junctions. Moreover the afternoon storm began. I looked around, Dozen of junctions and splitting roads later I saw a street sign! A real street sign! I had luck to pass a junction to a small village which caused the government to put a sign in an area which is nothing more than desert. My destination was one of the two inscriptions: 'San Juan, 24km". Oh, oh! I checked my water and realized I lost my last bottle somewhere. If the roads stay good and the wind does not start again...that was a usual but stupid thoughts. Of cause the roadcondition became horrible as it always changed from horrible to bad, back to horrible again. I made the math about the hours until my arrival, in case I make the right decisions at the numerous junctions. Moreover the afternoon storm began. I looked around, I was isolated. But south-west is south-west. Somewhere I have to find a more official road. I saw a farmer and walked over to have a talk and a sip of his water. "Oh, just 2km....no, 4km." Remembering the sign of 24km, which I still did not trusted, I insisted that he thinks twice about the right amount. It had kind of big imporyance for me to find out about the truth."Mhhh, ...it is 20km!" What a trustfully info, exactly what I needed. At least I was on a wider road which is the mainroad in this area (no paved road in a district as big as Corsica). The road was wide, not bad to cycle on and direction southwest. Suddenly I saw three cars coming in my direction. The first did not stop, it just pushed stones on me and left a dustcloud. The second stopped by seeing my jelling and rage-dance. "3km, 20min, we just left San Juan!" a astonished tourist told me out of his window placed seat. Again I started my math. Roadcondition, info quality plus the heavy wind: it will take about 40min. As I entered the village I saw a tandembike at a little marketplace. I bought potatochips, joghurt and two beer and we checked in the hotel "cabañas al sal" which is made out of salt bricks. Instead of crossing the border to Chile on the next day, I decided to stay a day longer by being all day long in my bed, reading and consuming what I am not allowed to bring over the border."After some hard but wonderful kilometers through sand and over stones, washboard and sanddevils, headwinds and party with indigenous, I reached the salt flats of Uyuni. Why not camping there? One of the best experiences I had, yet. Hundreds of kilometers on dirtroads and through the desert followed. Suddenly I was told that: The surrounding Atacama Desert is in a rain shadow that squeezes moisture out over the mountains and carries only dry air to the desert some places in the desert have not received rain in more than 500 years! The driest place on earth (beside the Antarctica, it never rains there, too) finally I entered the civilisation again, but Chile is too expensive. Tomorrow I cycle east to reach the border of Argentina, the last nation I will visit in my cycling trip until February."