Road going under waterfalls

The road going down from La Cumbre to Coroico near La Paz is rumored to be “The Death Road”, because of the dangerous conditions, narrow road and not less than 3345 meters of vertical descent. Though the road isn’t as dangerous anymore, because they build a new highway, and closed “The Death Road” for traffic, so now it is pretty much just bikers and the buses following the bikes going down the road.

That being said, the road is definitely worth mountain biking down. There are many companies in La Paz offering this trip, each with different prices, bikes and reason why you should choose these. I can only recommend the company DOWNHILL MADNESS, which seems to be in the middle of the price-range. They use Canadian Rocky Mountain bikes, and have English-speaking guides, just as all the other companies. Including in the price, you get the T-shirt (“Death Road Survivor”), and a CD with pictures and videos from your trip.

Ready to go down the Death Road

You start in the morning by getting the equipment you need in the right size (helmet, pants, gloves etc.) and then you drive up to La Cumbre (4640) where the trip starts. In the beginning the road is paved, and downhill on the asphalt you can go pretty fast. Then you go through a Coca checkpoint, where the police control for stuff that can be used to produce cocaine. Shortly after that, there is a short stretch where you have to go uphill – but because the weather was pretty bad this day, our guides decided just to put all the bikes on the bus, and drive to where the downhill started again. I wouldn’t mind going uphill, but being rainy and foggy, I didn’t really miss the challenge either.

From there on, The Death Road really started, going downhill on the unpaved and sometimes very narrow road. Makes one wonder how they actually where able to drives cars, trucks and busses on this road, in BOTH directions! No wonder their calling it the Death Road, when there was once traffic in both directions of the road. However, this is absolutely one of my best mountain biking experiences. Since it was rainy season, the weather was quite bad the first part, so unfortunately it was impossible to get a good view of how far down there was.

View from the hotel in Coroico, showing the new road back to La Paz

But on the lower part of the trip we got better weather, and luckily some nice views. In a distance of 3-4 kilometers, the weather changes from being ass-freezing to being hot-ass-hell. One moment everyone is wearing big jackets etc, and the next moment everyone is going in T-shirts and shorts.

The trips ends at Yolosa in a altitude of 1295 meters, where you can buy a cold beer and relax, knowing you “survived the Death Road”. After a little while you go to Coroico in the bus, to relax a few hours at a very nice Hotel, with big buffet and a very nice pool. The perfect ending to an amazing downhill experience. I can only recommend everyone doing the Death Road, if going through La Paz.

More photos from the Death Road, La Paz