The fishermen are returning from the sea. There is a strange kind of brown tint to the light. Dusk, and a shapeless cover of clouds. The four dogs are sleeping on the sand underneath the palm trees. The bartender made me a very strong Cuba Libre.
That brings back another set of memories, from Bolivia again. Biking down La via de la muerte, Death Road, formerly the stretch of road with the highest number of deaths per year in the world, now a tourist attraction. An adventurous day trip from La Paz. You start at a mountain pass at 4600 meters above sea level, and then the winding road takes you down to 1200 meters above sea level, from snow covered mountain tops and harsh Andean rocky mountainsides down to subtropical rainforest with huge turquoise butterflies fluttering between the big red and orange flowers.
I biked it with Natalia, Cecilia, Jonna and Alice in three hours, the speed such a rush – and the Cuba Libre that they served at the bar at the bottom went straight to our heads. The laughter just wouldn’t stop bubbling out of us. That, and the following couple of days in beautiful Coroico, bathing in waterfalls and going on impromptu butterfly safaris by the river in the bottom of the valley, and the delicious strawberry milkshakes that the woman on the street corner at the bottom of the hill made, and, oh, the incredible breakfast buffet at the hotel, was probably the best part of my half year in Bolivia and Peru.
So my Cuba Libre now: Only fond memories.
This truly is an ecolodge. There isn’t even electricity. Only solar-powered torches for when the sun has gone down. There is a solar-powered battery-charging station, but it short-circuited when I tried to charge my computer. It can only handle phones.
It’s quite fine, really. I have a good book, and plenty of yarn still. A bag of unpeeled groundnuts that I brought with me from Burkina. And I don’t know how many hours of podcasts on my phone. Everything I write from here on will be by hand.
The only thing is Buffy. She’ll have to do without me for a week. But she is an incredibly capable woman. She’ll survive just fine without me, I’m sure of it.
Katja Malmborg 