I spent a few days looking around La Paz (and trying to breath), and to be honest, enjoyed some western comfort. I happened to get my own room with cable tv so I didn't leave my room until the coverage of the 'Tour of Italy' had finished. La Paz is the biggest city in Bolivia and usually at the centre of the usual turmoil that is Bolivia. The miners where striking while I was there to add to the usual chaos. The city is set in a huge basin (at about 3,800m) with mountains surrounding every side (housing has extending up the mountain sides too). From here we plan to head north to the jungle and pampas. In order to get there you have a few choices. Firstly, you can fly on a little twin prop. plane (expensive), secondly, you can get a bus down the 'most dangerous road in the world', or thirdly, you can get on a mountain bike and descend 64km's of downhill (dropping nearly 4,000m's!) with peddle power. The third option seemed the safest to me. So we went with a guide up to the top of the mountain behind La Paz and started the descent. It starts of at almost 5,000m and cold. The first hour there was an option to join one of the guides for some single track which 6 of us put our hand up for. The guide was 3 time Bolivian MTB and road champion (so he said) so I let him lead the way, well away. There was only a couple of technical bits (which led to a couple of quality tumbles from two lads) but the rest was cruising through small villages with stone houses and fences and small flocks of sheep. It ended with a half hour climb. It really wasn't steep, but at 4,500m it felt like a wall. Luckily, the rest of the day was dooooowwwnnnhiiilll. At this point we turned onto the 'world's most dangerous road'. It has earnt its name due to the huge drops (as much as 1,000m) on the single lane dirt road. They say that on average a truck or bus falls off once a week (only one rider since last year though I'm told). This is not as busy as the Princess Highway, so those odds seemed very ugly to me (especially since we had to get a bus the rest of the way to the jungle after we got to the bottom of the hill). The trip started on a barren moutain top and very quickly descends into lush forest and beautiful valleys. After 64km of mud and dust we jumped in a bus and headed up to a little town called Coroico for a drink, food and shower. We stayed here for a couple of days (the accomodation had a pool, bar, restaurant and rooms with views for $10, why wouldn't you?) before heading north to a town called Rurrenabaque in the Bolivian jungle (and hopefully surviving the rest of the 'world most dangerous road' in a bus).