Although it's more than half-covered with jungles, Bolivia is best known for its Altiplano. Mostly flat, that high-altitude plain comprises lakes like Poopo and Titicaca, and salt lakes like Uyuni.
On a loaded bicycle, it's yet another story. Places to refuel are so scarce that food and water reserves are the same as in any desert. Temperature is also deceptive: although most of the Bolivian Altiplano is well within the tropical zone, the altitude wind can change warm days into normal mountain days. As for the nights, they're as cold as can be at such a latitude. Early mornings are a good way to remember that, and a perfect time to catch a cold.
The Altiplano roughly covers
one half of Bolivia, but the country cannot be reduced to this high plain.
High altitude does mean mountains, and the peaks that surround the Altiplano
look falsely ordinary for anyone familiar with the Alps, the Rockies or
the Himalayas. Yet there's one major difference: being on a plain makes
them look smaller than they are, while most of them are between 5,000
and 6,000 meter high.
Yet Bolivia is also a country of jungles. From north-east to south-west,
the green, low-altitude territories of Bolivia join with those of Peru,
Brazil and Paraguay. No more mountains, no more altitude, this is already
the kingdom of vast forests and wide rivers. The jungle accross the border
was once Bolivian, but the country kept on losing land to its neighbours
since the 19th century, at the time when Chile absorbed its access to
the Pacific. Each and every neighbour, including Argentina, got its share
of Bolivia. In the West, the jungle of the Gran Chaco was the theater
of a bloody war against Paraguay, a true rehearsal of Second World War,
in which most weapon constructors tested their new toys. By then, Bolivia
had lost more than 50 % of its territory.