Friday 10th Oct 2003, our Awesome
Andes tour arrived in Puno, Peru, to
be informed that our intended pas-
sage back to Bolivia via the usual bor-
der crossing of Copacabana was not
viable; the highway to the capital, La
Paz, had been blockaded by Bolivian
compañeros.
These peasant farmers were most
displeased at their President’s latest
decision to export 'their' natural gas
reserves to the USA. More accurately,
they were displeased at his decision
to pipe it through Chile to a coastal
port rather than through Peru. Boliv-
ia is on far more friendly terms with
Peru than with Chile. The pipeline
would cost far less to build through
Peru than Chile.
Several engineering and construc-
tion companies in Chile were part-
owned by the Bolivian President and
stood to win lucrative contracts in
this decision, a fact not wasted on the
impoverished Bolivian farmers.
This was the final straw as far as
they were concerned. They were de-
termined to bring down this corrupt
government by effectively closing
down La Paz and several other major
city centres.
The following day we enjoyed our
cruise visiting Peru's floating islands
on Lake Titicaca and then on Sunday
the 12th we headed for the alternative
border crossing at Desagaudero,the
highway from there to La Paz is the
road less travelled, hopefully less
subjected to the road blockades.
We managed to get ourselves and
our nine bikes through the bureau-
cratic hassle of immigration and cus-
TRAVERSE
49
toms in much smarter time than any
previous border crossing, the day was
looking pretty good. We set off to La
Paz and soon discovered what these
road ‘blockades’ actually meant; the
farmers had strewn rocks, boulders,
logs, old tyres, wheel rims, car chas-
sis, virtually anything they could lay
their hands on, onto the highway for
almost the entire length of the 115
kilometres!
At first it was rather entertaining,
as our bikes and two 4wd backup ve-
hicles had little trouble negotiating
the obstacles, we even took photos of
the bizarre scenario.
Approaching La Paz however, we
were stopped at a military check-
point and advised that we were free
to proceed but we had no chance of
making it to the capital on the high-