Spoiler alert: We made it to the bottom in one piece, alive with no broken bones or injuries!

We had heard about Bolivia’s infamous “Death Road” AKA “World’s Most Dangerous Road” (two really great, reassuring names) a while ago, and it was always in the back of our heads as something we would maybe do once we got to La Paz.

This road connects La Paz to the small town of Coroico and was built in the 1930s by Paraguayan prisoners of war. The name “Death Road”, according to our guide, comes from the deaths of these slaves during the road’s construction. It’s second name, “World’s Most Dangerous Road”, comes from the high number of car accidents and related deaths on the road. (It’s real name is Yungas Road, but where’s the drama in that?)

The road is narrow and steep, but traffic flows in both directions and a huge cliff drop lies to one side … It’s not hard to imagine why there were so many accidents.

An alternate—and safer—route between La Paz and Coroico opened in 2006, though the Death Road is still open to cars. However, the main people you’ll find on it today are tour groups mountain biking down its 32 kilometers.

So that brings us to March 6th, when Vikram and I are discussing if we want to do this ourselves.

I was really hesitant at first—again, the names and history are not that reassuring. And it’s mountain biking! Downhill! On a narrow road that has a sheer cliff on one side! What!!! I was not feeling so hot about this.

On top of all that, it’s a fairly expensive activity. Prices at different companies range from $75 to over $100 per person. (And cheaper isn’t better in this case, since you want to make sure the bikes are in good shape, your guides know what they’re doing, and so on.)

But we ultimately concluded to do it, for three main reasons:

1. Realistically, we wouldn’t have the opportunity to do this unique activity again.
2. I was reassured that many other “beginners” do this route, and the priority for any company is getting you down safely.
3. You should do one thing a day that scares you, right?

That’s how we ended up at over 4,500 meters above sea level, on our two trusty mountain bikes named Garza and Estados Unidos.

We started the morning with a safety lecture (main takeaways: trust your bike and don’t abuse your brakes) and an offering to Pachamama, the equivalent of Mother Earth in the Inca tradition. This offering consisted of us pouring a bit of 96% alcoholic liquid on the ground, a bit on each of our bikes, and then a bit for each of us. Vikram and some other people actually sipped directly from the bottle, but I just dipped my finger in and tasted a tiny bit. It was basically nail polish remover.

After that, it was time for mountain biking!

The descent began with 22 km on highway, which would bring us to the actual Death Road. While this part was still scary because if you crashed you would wipe out on hard concrete, it was also useful to get used to the bike, speed, and braking before we had to worry about wiping out over a cliff.

Finally, we came to beginning of Death Road. Some people in our group were big speed demons, hurtling themselves and their bikes down the World’s Most Dangerous Road. Then there was the middle of the pack, making good time down the road (Vikram was here).

And then there was me, unsurprisingly at the very end, so far behind everyone else that I couldn’t see anyone. If there was a race for slowest and steadiest, I would have won hands-down. 

But the ride ended up being great! Sure, I was nervous constantly and potentially over-used my brakes, but it was an entirely new and unique experience for me. We started riding above—or really, within—the clouds because we were so high up, but as we made our way down the clouds broke and we were surrounded by beautiful changing scenery from mountain tops to jungles.

We got to bike beneath waterfalls—including one spot where you had no other option but to go right through one!

While it definitely was a bit heart-stopping to look over the cliff side, I generally felt very secure about getting down without falling into those depths. In fact, the act of downhill mountain biking ended up being more scary and difficult for me than worrying about the cliff. 

But as our guide said at the beginning, just trust your bike. And it’s hard to explain now, but the bikes really were exceptional at keeping you safe and upright. There were countless times where I felt myself starting to lose control or fall, but the bike kept me up.

I’m proud to say I only had one minor fall (with plenty of room to spare between me and the cliff side), and otherwise successfully made it to the end of the road. Cheap beer has never tasted so good!

Travel Notes

• We went withGravity Assisted Mountain Biking, one of the top-rated mountain biking companies for Death Road. We were very happy with them, especially with the quality of the bikes they provided.
• You definitely need to know how to ride a bike, but you don’t need to have any experience mountain biking. Neither of us had ever gone mountain biking before, and we were fine.
• Our tour company took pictures for us during the trip with their own cameras (and then shared them with us via Dropbox and Facebook), so it was nice to not have to worry about that.
• Prepare for lots of different weather. The road starts at around 4,500 meters above sea level where it can be chilly and rainy. The road ends at around 1,500 meters above sea level in the jungle, so it’s much warmer here.

All pictures courtesy of Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking