With my bike in the shop as a result of the little spill I took into the chasm during the crossing, we returned to the hostel in Villazón, Bolivia.

That evening I got the most violent shakes I have ever had in my life. I got up in the middle of the night with diarrhea. After finishing up in the bathroom, I came back to the room only to run back to the bathroom to vomit. I didn't make it to the toilet, but I did get to the sink. I came back shaking. I took two cipro (a strong antibiotic that kills just about anything), but was shaking too much after that to take any fever-reducing ibuprofen. I couldn't even control my hands well enough to grab the bottle or tablets. I got in bed telling Aldé that I was "cold as sin." He took one look at me and released an "oh shit." I don't remember all that much, but I awoke later to see he had piled all the blankets in the room plus sweaters and his sleeping bag on top of me, giving me a good 2 feet of covers.

Today, May 19th, I am feeling a lot better, but I'm still not ready to jump on the bike and take off. However I will need to ride la bicha a bit today to see if the new brake pads give a little. I am quite thankful for Aldé's meticulous attending. He took my temperature every few hours and organized my pill regimen, keeping a running log of all relevant data. This is no doubt a product of his EMT experience in CT.

That evening he rented a couple movies on VCD, we watched one on my computer.

We took off from Villazón on May 20th. We checked out the train that was running to Oruro. It cost 68 bolivianos (exchange rate is about 8 boliviano for one dollar) per person and then we were told that to ship the bikes it would be 12 bolivianos each for the space, then 9 bolivianos for every 10 kilograms. It sounded like a good deal as we were not sure of the condition of the road we would be traveling on. All we knew was it was dirt road and not asphalt. Another confounding factor was that I was still not feeling one hundred percent.

We packed up, grabbed some bread, cheese, and cold cuts and headed over to the station to get there by 6:00pm. There was some confusion on the time the train was to leave. The sign said 6:10pm, the train guy had told me 8:30pm, and the peeps at the hostel were convinced that there was no train that left after 3:30pm.

We cruised through town drawing the attention of all (as usual) with our little bikes packed to the brim. We pulled up right onto the loading platform. After rapping with a couple heads, we knew the train was not going to be in until 10:30pm. It turns out everyone was wrong!

Aldé bounced out and got us some dinner while I kicked it with the bikes. He was gone for a good while. The loading dock guys came out as we were dining and asked about the bikes. They were wondering if they were being shipped. "Yes!" We replied through full mouths. They informed us it would have to take place after they ate dinner. We agreed and continued enjoying our rotisserie chicken.

When the workers returned and opened the gate, they asked if there was any gas in the tanks. We said "yes." (The boss guy had mentioned earlier that we would need to have the motorcycles completely empty of gas to ship, a prospect that I was not too excited about.) The workers asked how much gas was in the bikes. "About 10 liters." Their eyes went wide. "Could we take it out?" they asked. We said "no." "Ok, just put it up on the scale quickly," we were told. 140kg was the total. They took only one weighing of Aldé's bike and extrapolated that to 280kg for the both of them. When the boss dude came back the workers tried to help us. Smoothing over the gas tank issue, the workers just sputtered out the weight to the dock manager. The boss guy doubled the price on us. So it was now in fact 18 bolivianos per 10 kilos. We argued with him to his frustration, but he was not moving on this. "Company rules" he reported to us. "Motorcycles require extra care," he put in. I had already gone through the situation in my head, as Aldé continued to protest between pushed breaths. The fact was, we already bought our tickets, we needed to get to Cusco, Peru fast to meet up with my sister, and to top it off I still wasn't feeling that hot. We didn't have the ability to just be like "well forget it then." So we sucked up the extra cost. I felt thankful to the workers for saving us the forty-odd pesos in gas, which is about equal to the extra cost we paid.

We headed into the terminal and sat down by a mother, her rambunctious three-year-old son Brayan, and the boy's grandmother. All the children in the crowed terminal had come together and were playing some sort of jail game, with Brayan attempting to cause as much havoc as possible. I started up a conversation with his mother by asking her if she played the guitar; as she was carrying one along with her. She did and we launched into a conversation bouncing from music to politics. She told me of the movement in Bolivia and the victories and failures. She said it was beautiful to see her people organize but the issue of gas in Bolivia was far from over. They have changed some of the foreign policy but it is still not used to its potential for the people here in Bolivia she told me. They gave us some of their candied popcorn, the kind that is often sold in marketplaces throughout Bolivia. I helped carry their bags until we got to our train cars and had to part company. We bade them a good trip and they did the same.

The train trip was filled with Yankee movies dubbed in Spanish and a dust-filled ventilation system. It was about 17 hours. I believe we left Villazón at about midnight and got into Oruro around 5p.m. We packed up the bikes and headed out of the city, camping in the desert about 10 km out of town.