Back in La Paz, I only had 2 things to cover, but because that place is made for partying, it took another week to do them and another week of partying before I made my escape. The first of those was the much anticipated midget wrestling, billed as "Cholita wrestling", featuring as it does women dressed up in traditional Bolivian dress, wrestling with each other and with men.
My expectations of some midget content had been managed by others who'd recently been and said we'd be lucky to see any, but I felt a little short changed, if you'll excuse the pun. Still, it was one of the most amusing things I've seen and worth the effort.
The guys were all dressed up in ludicrous outfits, the referees got involved with the "fights" and the cholitas got stuck in. All were "goodies" or "baddies" as you could tell from the reaction of the locals who go every week. They get the crowd involved as well, and it's encouraged that you throw fruit or whatever at the "baddies" when they're "cheating" or throwing things themselves at the crowd.
They'd throw each other out of the ring and jump off the ropes, use props as weapons, chase each other around the arena, and it was all just very silly and very entertaining. The sight of a Cholita jumping from the ropes (click to play below) was worth the admission alone.
The other compulsory thing on my list was "Death Road" - a long downhill mountain bike ride down what they say is the world's most dangerous road, And it's true - people can and do die on that ride.
It starts when they drop you in the cold and rain at 4300m, and you ride down 65km of sealed road, overtaking trucks if you fancy. Which I did. Then you start the hard part - another 3-4 hours of nearly constant downhill (obviously not as hard as it would be going up...), with sheer drops several hundred feet down - if you ride off the edge you're not coming back up.
Our agency had good bikes so I got more cocksure as I went. Probably too much. I expected to be hanging at the back and taking it easy but instead I ended up pushing it as hard as I could and taking corners close to the edge. I enjoyed that ride from start to finish and would happily have been taken back to the top to do it all over again.
The visibility wasn't great in parts the day we did it, but the scenery was still clearly amazing and riding through the mist close to the top had an eerie atmosphere. If you should find yourself in La Paz considering doing Death Road, pay for a good company with good bikes and safety gear. Plenty of people have accidents that don't involve riding off the edge - 2 in our group had minor falls - but your odds are better if you've got better kit.
My expectations of some midget content had been managed by others who'd recently been and said we'd be lucky to see any, but I felt a little short changed, if you'll excuse the pun. Still, it was one of the most amusing things I've seen and worth the effort.
The guys were all dressed up in ludicrous outfits, the referees got involved with the "fights" and the cholitas got stuck in. All were "goodies" or "baddies" as you could tell from the reaction of the locals who go every week. They get the crowd involved as well, and it's encouraged that you throw fruit or whatever at the "baddies" when they're "cheating" or throwing things themselves at the crowd.
They'd throw each other out of the ring and jump off the ropes, use props as weapons, chase each other around the arena, and it was all just very silly and very entertaining. The sight of a Cholita jumping from the ropes (click to play below) was worth the admission alone.
The other compulsory thing on my list was "Death Road" - a long downhill mountain bike ride down what they say is the world's most dangerous road, And it's true - people can and do die on that ride.
It starts when they drop you in the cold and rain at 4300m, and you ride down 65km of sealed road, overtaking trucks if you fancy. Which I did. Then you start the hard part - another 3-4 hours of nearly constant downhill (obviously not as hard as it would be going up...), with sheer drops several hundred feet down - if you ride off the edge you're not coming back up.
Our agency had good bikes so I got more cocksure as I went. Probably too much. I expected to be hanging at the back and taking it easy but instead I ended up pushing it as hard as I could and taking corners close to the edge. I enjoyed that ride from start to finish and would happily have been taken back to the top to do it all over again.
The visibility wasn't great in parts the day we did it, but the scenery was still clearly amazing and riding through the mist close to the top had an eerie atmosphere. If you should find yourself in La Paz considering doing Death Road, pay for a good company with good bikes and safety gear. Plenty of people have accidents that don't involve riding off the edge - 2 in our group had minor falls - but your odds are better if you've got better kit.
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