Around the Block 2007

Butch Cassidy here we come!  At the Bolivian customs office at the border bright and early only to find that they donīt come in until 8:30.  Wait.  Finally they arrive, but it takes 1/2 hour to get the computers (YES, computers) up and going and evidently there is only one guy who really knows how to use them....

Very polite, but VERY SLOW.  We have a train to catch!  Finally thru (and legal!) by 10am and we rush to the train station.  We have decided that the motos need work and we need rest, so we will load them (and ourselves) on the "train of death" as it is called (because of the boredom of the trip, not the danger) and ride to Santa Cruz.  The train leaves at 12:45pm, but is running about 3 hours late.  Good thing, īcause we need to go to the Police and get "permission"  (read:  $8 ) to ship the motos by train.  Of course we also "needed" 2 tramitadores (paper handlers) to help us thru the whole mess.

But finally the train comes and the motos are "papered" and loaded (physically) 6 ft up into the box car and tied down well.  We grab some lunch (full plate of steak w/ rice and fried bannanas for $0.85 each!  I think I am going to like Bolivia!) and we go up to wait for the train.  It is slow in getting here, slow in getting ready for the return trip, and slow once it gets going...  We stick our GPS out the window and celebrate when we reach the grand speed of 28mph!  But then the way the train bangs along from rail to rail, weaving and counter-weaving, we decide that maybe 20mph would be better.  We may never arrive, but at least we would be alive!

We buy seats in the PULLMAN "sleeping" coach.  Evidently "sleeping" means that the seats recline, except that ours are up against the bulkhead and DONīT recline!  But the coach is not full and we grab 2 seats each where they do recline.  Hope we can sleep with all the BANG, BANG, BANG of the tracks......

NEXT DAY: day33traintosantacruz.htm

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