In the 1930s and 1940s, the Death Road was built by military prisoners from Paraguay to create a link between La Paz and the Jungle. Rising 3,600m in 64km, this road is only 3.2m wide at some points (just wide enough for a truck) and was the only route to the jungle until 2006. The road gets it's well deserved name from the 200-300 people who died on it and the over 26 vehicles lost over the edge, every year the road has been open ... more than died in the war between Paraguay and Bolivia. The reason for these deaths, aside from the narrow road, is that at some points, there is a 600m drop over the edge, straight down. The only bright side to biking it these days is that the road is closed to public transport (due to construction work on the new road, it will be open to public transport for a month in the upcoming weeks). 
Because of the reputation of this road, we opted to travel with one of the more reputable companies, Downhill Madness. This company supplied us with dual suspension bikes, full face helmets and a guide who worked as a paramedic in Germany and is well versed in high mountain rescues. Since there is a 3,600m vertical drop over the 64km of road, peddling was not that important as you were able to reach breakneck speeds thanks to gravity. The first half of the trip is on a wide paved road that serves as the alternative for public transport. It isn't until you get on the gravel road that the trip gets scary ... and I mean scary. This road had a lot of loose gravel and the guide stopped every 5-10 minutes to do a head count to make sure no one went off the edge (one of our guys did, but luckily it wasn't a dangerous section of the road and he got back on the bike unharmed). At each stop, in case we weren't scared enough, our guide would tell the story of the person for whom the corner is named. It seemed every corner had a story about someone dying, and to be honest, most of the accidents are preventable. One such story tells about two guys who were joking around on the trail, bumping into each other and punching each other as they rode, that is until they hit too hard and one went into the wall and the other went off the cliff. Another is about a woman who was backing her bike up to make room for a truck going by, only to find she was too close to the cliff and over she went. We saw a car over the edge of the cliff that went there because the driver was drunk (the trip used to take up to 5 days for heavy trucks, so the drivers would chew coco leaves, drink alcohol and smoke to stay awake). We saw the site of the worst accident (100 people died on a bus that went over the edge), the last death (they think it was due to a heart attack ... no wonder given the height of the cliff). Our driver's only accident on the road was when he was hit off the side ... the car is still there. Neediess to say, these stories definitely made sure our adrenalin was pumping.
Now if the stories of the deaths and the height of the cliffs and the narrow road wasn't enough to scare you, there was even more to frighten you. First of all, because the road was so narrow, they changed the rules of the road so you are driving on the left side. This makes perfect sense, especially since the driver sits on the left and can look out his window to make sure he is still on the road when a truck passes. The problem is that when you are biking, the cliff is on the left side and the safe rock wall is on the right .... which side do you want to bike on? Next you have nice loose gravel and lots of rocks. When you turn left, you're scared of over-steering and going off the edge. When you turn right, you're scared the gravel will be too loose and you will go over the side. When there are no turns, you have to keep avoiding the rocks in the middle of the road to make sure you don't loose control of your bike (I hit a few of them on the way down, and let me tell you, you know you're alive when you hit them). Personally, I had my own unique issue to worry about, a guy who was showing off his mountain biking skills to his girlfriend, going very close to the edge, travelling fast, jumping and skidding his tires ... and he didn't feel he needed to give the person in front (me) 5m of space incase something happened. I seriously thought he was goign to hit my back wheel a few times and send me over the edge.Now it isn't all doom and gloom on this road. Because you are on the edge of the Andes and the jungle, the view is remarkable. We started out with a beautiful, but cold day at the top (over 4,500m) then drifted into some cloud cover and then exited in the jungle. Rather breathtaking scenery all around us. We even got to cross two rivers (at the bottom where it was flat) by riding through them. At the end we had a nice lunch at a hotel in the jungle (even if the hotel was at the top of the hill in the town, and the road was so steep that the support vehicle couldn't get up it with us inside). Then we got to finish the day off by squeezing in a 15 passenger van (all 12 of us) and going on our lovely 4 hour drive back to La Paz for the night.
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