This morning we left Puno on Lake Titicaca heading for Chile. We climbed up to 4,500 meters where we spent most of the day crossing the Andes - we peaked at 4594 meters = 15072 feet which is high desert. You can tell there were so many turning optons on the road above that Gustavo felt obligated to ask the local rocket scientists for directions... Then we hit the 80 km section of tierra (earth) road - only in this case "earth" is dry sand - not good for heavy motos. we dropped air pressure and ended up only having to run about 50 km in sand - hard work but beautiful and fun.
At the end we tried to take a short cut up a hill (that I knew was a mistake). We ended up planting all the bikes to their axle in sand - no trouble you say? - try picking up and turning around a bmw 1200gs on a steep incline in the baking sun, with no footing and
nothing to breath - just walking 10 feet uphill was enough to make us all gasp. (click the image below and see the trucks at the top of the hill - it's taller than you realize.)
We finally got on our way and then had a glorious downhill ride where we dropped about 10,000 feet (to alt 4,688) in about an hour through some gnarled switch-backs. I was amazed when I looked in the mirror and saw a semi barreling down on us - it shouldn't have been possible - and when we turned up the heat so did he - I got tired of this dangerous game and signaled - we all pulled over.
When we rolled into the completely unexpected oasis of Moquegua we found a great little restaurant and asked for the specialty of the house (common to only serve one item in remote areas).
We were brought fried Cuy! and an onion salad - delicioso!
Cuy(e) translation Spanish - English : cuy(e) (cuis o cuyes pl) sm (LAm)
guinea pig.
Nick
via BlackBerry
