Itinerary and Route

My Long and Bumpy Road

I plan to travel by bicycle approximately 4,500 miles from LaPaz, Bolivia to Ushuaia, Argentina, a journey that I estimate will take four months, but I will take six because I want to stop and smell the salt flats, taste the wine and climb a mountain and ride with the Gauchos.

Bolivia

Brown, arid earth with mountain peak on horizon. Uyuni, Bolivia.
Uyuni, Bolivia

My trip will start at an elevation of around 12,000 feet in Oruro, Bolivia. From Oruro, I will ride across the largest salt flats in the world (Salar de Uyuni).

From there I will continue to gain and lose altitude through the Southwest corner of Bolivia over, arguably, some of the worst and most remote roads in the world. This challenge will take place in an area that delivers one of the most extreme daily temperatures changes on the planet (days in the 90’s/nights in the 30’s).

The Route

sa-map-new-2

Trip Highlights: Jump on Your Virtual Bike and Join Me!
  1. In Bolivia I’ll ride across the Salar de Uyuni , the largest salt flats in the world.
  2. Follow me as I cross into the Atacambe desert, the driest desert in the world.
  3. Have a glass of wine with me in Mendoza, Argentina’s wine country.
  4. In the pampas of Argentina I hope to meet the first Gaucha: women rock!
  5. Send positive vibes as I ride over 1,000 miles through the remote region of Patagonia to the “End of the World.”

If you’ve been to these remote areas of the world, write me a post to tell me about it and share your experience!

Chile

From here, I will cross the boarder into Chile and enter the town of San Pedro de Atacambe located in the driest desert in the world.

San Pedro de Atacama. Steam plumes rise from brown earth.
San Pedro de Atacama

After riding through Argentina on Route 40, I will cross back over into Chile via Bariloche, Argentina. There, I will begin the ride through Patagonia on the Carretera Austral (a mostly hard gravel road built by Pinochet to connect Patagonia to the rest of Chile) to Villa O’Higgins where the road ends. Although remote and isolated, Patagonia is sure to please with snow clad mountains, lakes, rainforests, glaciers, rivers, waterfalls and fjords like no other place on earth.

During my trip, I estimate I will:
  1. Drink 540 liters of water.
  2. Repair5 flat tires.
  3. Burn a gazillion calories.
  4. Get hundreds of bug bites.
  5. Use 5 bottles of sunscreen.
  6. Have 5 major meltdowns and hundreds of minor meltdowns.

 

Argentina

I will cross into northern Argentina and follow Route 40 down the spine of the Andes to the wine country of Mendoza and into a deserted landscape with the highest concentration of volcanic cones in the world. Upon reaching the southern resort town of Bariloche, I will cross back over into Chile to Puerto Montt.  From O’Higgins, I will cross back over onto  Route 40 in Argentina and begin the torturous ride through the mighty western winds which make this section of the ride one of the most challenging parts of the trip. Along this route, I continue down to Ushuaia, “The End of the World” and the end of my trip.

Map of South America with Countries – Single Color by FreeVectorMaps.com
Icons made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com is licensed by CC 3.0 BY
Photos courtesy of  Pixabay